


Love Always Wins In The End

by StupendousMysticWerewolf



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Marriage Law Challenge
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-28
Updated: 2017-10-07
Packaged: 2018-11-05 21:53:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 36,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11022330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StupendousMysticWerewolf/pseuds/StupendousMysticWerewolf
Summary: Rose Weasley and Scorpius Malfoy have been appointed Head Students by the Headmistress, at least they have that going for them. What they don't have going for them is the fact an old Marriage Law has been brought into effect to increase the number of magical born children after the war decimated them. They have a eight month deadline... Can they stop it?





	1. Why Is It Always Me?

Chapter 1

“Rose! Come on we’re going to be late! Hugo, you too, hurry up.” My mother, Hermione Granger-Weasley called up the stairs to my brother and me.  
Hugo shouted back down that he was just putting his Eagle Owl Iris into her carrier for the Journey to school. Hugo and mum were the only ones in this household who had an Owl, I didn’t want a pet during my first year at Hogwarts, and I just used to borrow my cousin Albus’ Owl Gynx during term or use my mum’s Owl Rhea when she sent me letters. That was until third year when over Christmas break Crookshanks brought home kittens. He had fourteen in total between three different mothers, all belonging to our crazy cat lady neighbour Mrs. Willow; she is an elderly witch who breeds Kneazle’s and cross-breed Kneazle’s for a living, since these were accidents though she decided not to charge us for any of them, however my mum did give her G500 for the inconvenience.  
I had already packed everything I needed except for my cross-Kneazle cat Vixen, she was currently asleep on the end of my bed. Picking up Vixen quickly I put her in her cat travel box, which she absolutely hated and hurried down the stairs.  
We quickly ate breakfast and then headed off to Kings Cross station in London, we currently live in Godric’s Hollow, it’s a small Wizarding community in the West Country which many muggle’s do not know about; we have to apparate to the station because the drive would take too long. Since I was now a seventh year I could now apparate on my own so I told my mother I would meet her on the platform.  
I pictured the platform with the Scarlet steam train which takes me to my second home and felt a tightening in my stomach and felt a pop. Opening my eyes I saw a bustling platform, full of children from the ages of 11 to 18years old all heading off to school. Some were still dressed in their muggle clothes like me and others were already in their Robes. Walking a bit further in I spotted my Uncle Harry Potter and his wife Ginny Potter née Weasley with their two children Albus and Lily.  
“James decided to give it a miss?” I asked as soon as I arrived, hugging Lily and nudging Albus.  
“Yeah, he has training today along with Fred and Roxy; I can’t believe they all made it into professional Quidditch. Even if they are on the Reserve team at the minute” Albus said laughing. James his older brother and Fred our cousin were the Chasers for the Gryffindor House Team which won for 5 years straight, beating Albus’ Slytherin team by a mile. Roxanne who was Fred’s twin sister she played Beater with Xavier the current captain for this year and also my ex-boyfriend since just before the summer of this year, but since she graduated last year we have to find a replacement, and for James and Fred too.  
“I know being picked up by the Montrose Magpies is amazing. Although I am surprised that Roxy went to the Holyhead Harpies, but that has been her favourite team since forever, but she never normally likes playing against Fred.” I said to Albus, he was my closest cousin, out of the whole lot, other than Lily, Victoire and Dominique. Albus has been my playmate since birth since our birthdays are about 3 months apart myself being the oldest out of both of us. We have always been close, even when he got put into Slytherin we still remained close. He comes to hang out with me on occasion, sometimes even spends time with my friends, although I do think that’s because he had a crush on my friend Bleu-Belle Thistle before he started dating Verity Robertson a fellow seventh year Slytherin, although it was actually Francesca Longbottom otherwise known as Frankie who had the crush on Albus.  
“It might be because she wants to distance herself from her brother, you know?” Albus said to me. I just nodded; Roxy and Fred’s relationship was a difficult one. They loved each other and they were as close as a set of twins can be, complete each other’s sentences and they get on really well but the rivalry between them is ridiculous. They always try to outdo each other, and when Fred and James were offered spots of the reserve team of the Montrose Magpies but with no spots for Roxy she was really upset, so she went to the next best team in a league which Aunt Ginny happens to be the Manager for, even during her job at the Daily Prophet as a Quidditch correspondent.  
“Rose, you do know who the Head Boy is right?” Albus asked taking me away from my thoughts.  
“No why?  
“Because I think you might need to know who it is. Its – “Albus said before he got cut off.  
“Rose, sorry about that, we saw some reporters so we had to skirt around them. They follow us all year round, when can’t they just leave us be. It’s not like everything is already being documented for the whole Wizarding world to see.” My mother practically growled. We knew who she was talking about. An elderly reporter who must be at least in her sixties now called Rita Skeeter. She loves to report on those of the Weasley/Potter/Lupin families. Unfortunately, it’s not even as though we are safe at school, her grandchild Holly Skeeter is a seventh year Hufflepuff, she is practically the gossip queen, she sends her grandmother and her father the gossip that’s around school. That’s how Witch Weekly found out about mine and Xavier’s break-up it hadn’t even been a day before it was plastered all over the Gossip Columns of Witch Weekly.  
“It’s okay mum.” I smiled and hugged her hard. I would miss her. It must be so hard to be at home on your own all the time. Ever since dad died it’s been hard.  
My dad died when I was in my second year of Hogwarts – Hugo was a first year –, He was on a mission with the Auror Department when it happened. A former Death Eater that they were trying to round up managed to disarm and then kill him with the Killing Curse and escaped. Uncle Harry who wasn’t there at the time set a team of highly trained Hit Wizards after him. They managed to find him and brought him back to be tried and sentenced to Azkaban. He was sentenced to life by my mother. It’s not enough though, it doesn’t bring him back. Nothing will.  
My mum had to go through a lot of counselling and even had to be medicated. It was horrible. Hugo and I were at school at the time, so the rest of the Weasley’s especially my Aunt Ginny were looking out for her. Not well enough though apparently, because my mum tried to commit suicide at one point. She then got committed to St. Mungo’s where a team of specially trained Healers helped her get better. She is a lot better now though, but she still attends counselling.  
I looked at the time and saw it was quarter to eleven, and my mum had wandered off to talk to somebody. Looking around I saw her talking to Astoria Malfoy. Yes, you’re probably wondering as to why my mother is talking to her sworn enemy’s wife. Well, you see believe it or not, Astoria is a Healer. She was actually one of the Healers who helped my mum in the first place, through that experience they became friends, and ironically, she became friends with Draco Malfoy too. She goes around to their Mansion, they sold the Manor not long after Draco inherited it from his father who was in Azkaban, he then destroyed it along with all the dark artefacts in there and moved himself, his wife and his mother Narcissa to a nicer newer Mansion in Cornwall, not too far from us in Godric’s Hollow actually.  
Astoria although pureblood is actually one of the nicest women you could meet. She doesn’t believe in all of the blood supremacy crap that was being said during the second Wizarding war. She actually fought on the side that my parents were fighting for. So when her parents found out they disowned her, her sister Daphne did too. Now however, she is a respectable witch and head of her department at St. Mungo’s. She also caused Draco to grow up and fix his reputation. He has done that by becoming the Deputy Head of the Law Department which specialises in sending bad wizards to Azkaban.  
Their son however, Scorpius Malfoy, is the bane of my existence. Since Dad passed away we have to spend a lot more time with the Malfoy’s because my mum sometimes goes over there to talk to Astoria out of office hours, when she isn’t feeling great for a couple of hours, and since Draco is the Deputy Head of the Magical Law Enforcement division in the Ministry he goes in there and covers for her when she needs it.  
I sighed, _better get this over with_ , I thought, I headed over to the Malfoy’s, Albus in tow, my brother decided to stay with Albus’ younger sister Lily.  
“Hello Rose, lovely to see you sweetheart. How was your summer?” Astoria Malfoy asked me politely. She was always so polite, and well spoken.  
“I’m fantastic thank you Mrs. Malfoy, and my summer was very good thank you. I made Head Girl, so I’m looking forward to that.” I said smiling feeling very proud of myself.  
Scorpius’ younger sister Phoenix then started giggling. She looked to Albus who shrugged. “You haven’t told her yet I take it Al?” Phoenix said with a smile, holding back laughter.  
“Nope, didn’t get around to it, Nixie thanks.” Al looked slightly ashamed.  
“Get around to what?” I asked, just as I did I saw Scorpius walking over with his current slag Mitzi Parkinson, she was pretty I grant you but she was as thick as a troll, maybe she was part troll. Her younger sister Missy isn’t much better either in all fairness, their half-sister Lorelle Goyle however, is actually quite smart, but she is ugly as sin.  
“Oh Weasley, it’s so nice to see you, had a good summer I hope. I heard you made Head Girl, guess that means we will be seeing an awful lot of each other this year what with us sharing a dorm and whatnot. See you at the Head’s meeting. Bye mum, bye dad, I’ll write soon.” He said turning to hug his parent’s goodbye he then turned to get on the train.  
I watched as he walked off and onto the train with his little girl toy following after him. I turned to Albus and he started backing away with his hands up in a surrendering posture.  
“I promise you Rosie, I was going to tell you. But so many things happened over the summer it slipped my mind and I tried to tell you earlier but your mum showed up and now this. I’m so sorry.” He said quickly.  
“You Albus Potter are in deep trouble.” I practically growled.  
“Now dear, there is no need for that. I doubt Scorpius will cause you that much trouble. He’s a good boy.” Astoria said smiling. I scoffed and even Phoenix stifled a laugh, the youngest Malfoy’s however were not that controlled, the twins Lynx and Lyra Malfoy began laughing hysterically.  
“What’s so funny Lynx, Lyra?” Draco asked.  
“They may be okay in front of you guys but normally if there isn’t a fight between them within two weeks of school starting then something’s wrong with them. Making them work together as head students was a death wish waiting to happen, wouldn’t be surprised if the school was completely destroyed by the end of the year.” Lynx said walking away laughing with Lyra following onto the train Phoenix not far behind them.  
“Well, no fighting this year okay Rosie, anyway you should probably get on the train now. Have a great last year my darling. See you soon, I love you.” My mum said and hugged me and my brother goodbye.  
“Make sure you write Hugo, and make sure your owl gets let out!” mum called after Hugo who just waved his hand in acknowledgement without turning back round.  
I shook my head and headed towards the compartment that my friends and I have had since our first year. Upon entering it I found that my two best friends were there, Bleu-Belle Dove Thistle and Frankie Longbottom, along with Jonathan Wood Belle’s boyfriend and Xavier Shacklebolt my ex-boyfriend fortunately we are still friends though. Lorcan and Lysander Scamander were in there too as were Paddy Finnigan and his girlfriend Carmen Adler.  
Bleu-Belle was a Metamorphagus just like my cousin-in-law Teddy Lupin is. She is the only one in her family out of four siblings, she keeps saying she was adopted but I doubt it, her younger sister’s Fern Raven and Arden Swan would look so much like her if their hair was bright pink. Arden’s twin Aspen Jay though looks nothing like any of them, looking more like their father than their mother. Her hair is her favourite colour of pink, a bright magenta colour; her eyes though were a pale blue. If you ever wanted to know what mood Belle was in you always look at her eyes. Pale blue is her happy, excited colour. When she was over worked they turn to a grey type colour, when she’s tired more like a silvery colour and when she’s angry, the best way to describe that colour is like the colour of thunder clouds. Belle changes her appearance so much it’s hard to tell what she actually genuinely looks like, but she tends to go for a more hourglass figure, which I have naturally.  
Frankie however, looked very similar to her dad in many ways. She has the dark hair and rounded face, she has long eyelashes which I am very jealous of because she never needs to wear mascara, and her dark brown almond shaped eyes look just like the colour of chocolate. Frankie isn’t as skinny as Belle and I, but she has a beautiful figure nonetheless. Unfortunately, though, because she does hang around with Belle and I she is the bigger one out of all of us, not by much mind you she’s still fit and healthy but that doesn’t stop all the bitchy girls and their fat shaming antics. During fourth year Frankie suffered with an eating disorder, she is getting better now after having to be admitted to Mungo’s, but she is much better.  
“How was your summer Rosie?” Frankie asked me as I walked in the room and hugged me.  
“It was great, I made Head Girl.” I said smiling, I was super excited. “You never told me you made Head Girl Rose?” My ex-boyfriend Xavier mentioned.  
That’s right, I hadn’t told him yet. He was away with his mum in Italy for three weeks – to get away from me after we split up just before the summer I suspect – whilst his father was on a mission for the Auror office.  
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before just now Xav, since you know you ran off to Italy to avoid me all summer and I wasn’t going to mention it in a letter. I thought we’d agreed to be friends after things between us ended, yet as soon as schools out you bugger off to Italy for however long.” I said with look, we had agreed to stay friends and obviously, that was one sided.  
“Yeah, I’m sorry Rose. I just needed to get away to get over us.” Xavier said to me looking down at his feet.  
“Yeah, I felt the same way, just didn’t expect you to go half away across Europe to do that.” I said with a perfectly sculpted red eyebrow.  
“I’m sorry Rose. Anyway, So who is the Head Boy then?” Xavier asked obviously interested. “It’s Scorpius Malfoy.” I said sneering, they all knew of my relationship with Malfoy. Yes, we got along for the benefit of classes, since we are always paired together because we are the smartest students in the year and because he is my cousin’s best friend, but that doesn’t mean that we are best friends. In fact, we are nowhere even near being friends.  
“Oh no, that’s going to be fun sharing a dorm with him Rosie.” Belle mentioned.  
“Yep, tell me about it, and guess who his new toy is this year.” “I heard it was Diamond Vaisey?” Frankie laughed, Diamond Vaisey was a complete idiot, no wonder she made Slytherin, she was the ditsiest person going.  
“I heard it was that Ravenclaw girl Ehren Bates?” Belle added.  
“Well, I think Ehren was during the summer because I remember seeing her at his manor, and Diamond was in the middle of sixth year. No, he is dating Mitzi Parkinson now, the sixth year Slytherin, or better known as ‘the whore of Slytherin’. No wonder he went for her, at least she’s an easy lay.” I said shaking my head.  
“Well, at least you know how to cast a muffalito charm. You’re going to need that on his bedroom door.” Lysander said, it was the first time one of the twins had spoken.  
“Yeah, good thing I learnt that in third year, I had to use it over the summer because of James and his girlfriend at the time. Urgh.” I said cringing that was something no thirteen-year-old needs to hear.  
“Rose, shouldn’t you be going to the head meeting, it’s half eleven now.” Lorcan mentioned.  
“Shit, cheers Lorc, I’ll see you at the feast guys.” I said goodbye but not before giving Belle and Frankie a hug each, Xavier didn’t look too pleased to be left out and after he found out that I was sharing a dorm with Scorpius he didn’t seem in a very good mood.  
Walking down the train towards the front I come across a compartment with a lot of shouting in. I open the door and see Malfoy’s siblings Lynx and Lyra along with Phoenix and their cousin Dahlia Greengrass-Page. Keira Finnigan and my brother Hugo and Cousin Lily were also sitting in there. Since they were best friends with Phoenix that made sense, however what didn’t make sense was the fact that they were all arguing.  
“What’s going on in here, I could hear you from halfway down the hall.” I yelled, so I could be heard over all the ruckus.  
“Nothing Rose, we just can’t agree on something.” Hugo said to me.  
“This better not be about the annual start of year prank.” I said with a smirk. Ever since Victoire and Teddy had been at school well more Teddy because he started two years before Victoire, the Weasley, Potter and Lupin families would do a start of year prank. The years that were the best were when James, Fred and Roxanne helped since they’re the pranking masterminds, now however, it’s left down to the younger family members to sort out the prank, and apparently, they’d enlisted the help of the Malfoy’s.  
“Maybe, but you can’t get us in trouble. We aren’t at school yet.” Lily pleaded. “Look, I may be Head Girl but that prank is tradition, I’m not going to be the one to break it, so when it happens, make sure you all have Plausible Deniability. That includes me, Albus and any other person linked closely to us.”  
“Don’t worry we’ve got that covered.” Phoenix smirked.  
“Well, good, and good luck” I said happily as I left them to their planning.  
Continuing to walk down the corridor I didn’t encounter anything amiss again so once entering the Head compartment I wasn’t expecting anything to be wrong.  
Once in there however, I saw Scorpius Malfoy with his trousers unbuckled and Mitzi Parkinson pressed against the wall with a pair of panties on the floor. Her head flung back making a hell of a lot of noise. Obviously, somebody had remembered a Muffliato spell but not a door locking spell.  
“What the hell is going on here!” I screeched, even I admit it was an unattractive sound.  
Stopping suddenly and stopping what he was doing Scorpius stood back and almost looked pleased that I’d caught them, tucking himself back into his boxers and turning around I blushed as I saw how big he was. _Do not think like that Rose!_  
“Mitzi, I think we’re done here. I’ll see you later.” Scorpius said dismissively to her.  
“But I wasn’t done Scorpius...” She trailed off seeing the look in his eyes.  
“Go set you wand on vibrate or something and finish yourself off.” He said waving his hand at her. She looked upset but left anyway.  
Turning back around to face me, he began to do his buttons of his shirt back up and rearrange his tie.  
“Did you like what you saw Weasley?” He said smirking.  
“Yes, lovely way to treat your girlfriend ‘ _put your wand on vibrate and finish yourself off_ ’ yes very classy.” I said rolling my eyes.  
“That’s not what I meant and you know it, I don’t give two shits about Parkinson, she is just a good shag. I saw when you looked down at my cock you blushed, never seen one this big?” He said smirking whilst buckling his trousers up drawing attention back to the rather large bulge in his pants.  
“Nope, I’ve seen bigger. I get bigger, I would just rather not have to see yours.”  
“Uh huh, whatever Weasley, let’s get on with this meeting shall we.” Sitting down at the desk I noticed a piece of paper with writing on it and a blank piece of paper. Looking down I scanned the piece of paper and saw all the names of the prefects and what extracurricular activities they did, such as Quidditch, Duelling Class or Gobstones Club.  
Sorting out who was patrolling with who proved to be difficult. Apparently, there was a spell on the piece of parchment that stopped us from being able to do same sex or house pairs. So that left me and Scorpius having to do our rounds together. I very kindly put Hugo and Phoenix together on patrols as well as Lily and Cassius Zabini who she has had a crush on since fifth year.  
Once all that was sorted we then began our rounds after duplicating the patrol time table five times and sending them off to school to be placed in the house common rooms for the prefects to look at, they would start their patrols tomorrow, the first night’s patrols is always done by the Head students and then some of the faculty. If there are any problems they can switch among themselves with permission granted by either me, Scorpius, the Headmistress or a Head of House.  
Once they were sent off Scorpius and I had to patrol the train and then we could head back to our compartments for the last thirty minutes of the train journey.  
“So how was your summer, your mum came over a few times but you and Hugo weren’t with her?” Scorpius asked politely, my mum went over to the Malfoy’s to talk with Astoria and to sort things out to do with work for Draco.  
“Yeah, I went to America and France for a couple of weeks with my older cousins Vicki and Nicki, what with their fashion design business Vicki needs to keep up with the latest trends for her V.A. Weasley stores, both Muggle and Wizarding clothes since she caters to Muggleborn’s too, so we went to New York first to view the fashion shows there and to Paris afterwards to see them there.” I said to Scorp, not that he would care of course.  
“What about Hugo?”  
“He was with my Uncle Charlie in Romania studying Dragons.” I mentioned.  
“Oh, that explains the lack of you lot at our Mansion this summer, you normally tag along when your mother comes over to see mine.” He said laughing. We had reached the end of the train and all seemed well, there was a slight cue for the toilets at the end but that was fairly common this time of day because of students changing into their school robes. We continued down towards the toilets when we heard some soft moaning. Looking towards each other went to the toilet on the left-hand side and listened carefully for a moment. Yep, there was definitely moaning.  
“Alohomora” I said to the door, it instantly clicked open and we pushed it. Standing there pressed up against the wall of the toilet was none other than my cousin Albus with his girlfriend of sorts Verity.  
“Oh, really Albus, could you not have waited for another half an hour until we got to the castle.” I mumbled, this was not the ideal position to be seeing my cousin and his girlfriend in.  
“Well, I guess but I was horny now…” Albus said trailing off with a smirk of his face.  
“I’m going to dock house points from both of you. 20 points each, seems fair doesn’t it Malfoy.” I said raising an eyebrow daring him to undermine me.  
“Nope, seems fair to me, in all honesty mate it’s not something I particularly want to walk into…” He said trailing off as I scoffed at his deliberate attempt at pretending that the same thing didn’t happen to him less than an hour ago. He was just lucky I didn’t take points from him and Mitzi too.  
“Anyway, we’re nearly at school. You two better get changed. See you at the feast Albus.” I said to my dear half naked cousin. He blushed in a un-Potter like manner and closed the door.  
We walked away from the toilets and went our separate ways. We did after all have to get changed into our robes too.  
I entered my previous compartment with my friends. Lorcan and Lysander were playing exploding snap with Paddy and Carmen. Belle and Frankie were gossiping over a copy of newest edition of Witch Weekly. Xavier and Jonathan weren’t in the room, which probably meant they were getting changed.  
“Rose, I know he’s your cousin but Louis is so hot.” Belle said as soon as I sat down beside them, whilst Frankie nodded beside her.  
“Seriously guys, that’s disgusting. I’m not exactly going to find my cousins attractive, am I? At least this isn’t as bad as what I had to walk into a second ago.” I said under my breath shivering. Belle managed to catch what I said though and raised her eyebrows in question.  
“What did you walk into a second ago?” She then asked after I refused to answer her silent question.  
“Well, Malfoy and I were doing our rounds and we heard a noise coming from the bathrooms up the other end of the train. So, we unlocked the door only to find my cousin Albus hooking up with Verity.”  
“Seriously? Albus Potter, was having sex on the train?” Paddy asked over hearing what I said.  
“Bloke’s a boss.” Lysander said laughing to himself.  
“No, bloke’s a douche. I really didn’t want to see that first thing in the morning.” I mumbled. I was still trying to erase the image from my brain.  
“Well this is going to make for an interesting year isn’t it then…” Frankie said sighing at the end.  
Yes, it was. A very interesting year.


	2. Marriage Law! You've Got To Be Kidding Me

Chapter 2

Scorpius POV

After my encounter with Rose Weasley, the train ride was pretty dismal. Entering the Slytherin compartment I saw Darius Zabini who had been my best friends since we were in nappies. Since my father and Zabini’s father Blaise were best friends after the war since Blaise had no involvement in the goings on with Voldemort, like my father he was let off with a warning for his pureblood views, which he has obviously since changed since Darius’ mother was a half-blood who was in the same year as my father and Blaise.   
My group of friends consist of Darius, Albus Potter, Gerard Greengrass-Page – who happened to be my cousin on my mother’s side, my Auntie Daphne’s son – Ezra Pucey and myself; we occasionally hung around with some of the Slytherin girls, Samantha Nott who is Gerard’s girlfriend, Verity and Esmeralda Slughorn. Esmeralda was the on and off again girlfriend of Darius, but since she was best friends with Sam and Verity she would be there when they were or if she was having a tiff with Darius then she’d send dirty looks at him.  
Anyway, since Mitzi had buggered off back to her compartment – finally, geez she was annoying – and I could finally relax and think about the fact that I’d be sharing a dorm room with Weasley. I’m not excited per se, it’s more because I like to irritate her that I am beginning to think that this is a great opportunity. You see mine and Rose’s relationship is a difficult one. We both love to hate each other. That’s the best way to describe it.   
Once in the compartment we stayed there for another 30 odd minutes just talking about the recent articles in the Daily Prophet about potential for a new law being brought out to stop the supposed purebloods becoming more and more interbred and the children dying from genetic defects, we were just discussing it before we pulled up to Hogsmeade station. Once there Albus, Darius, Gerard, Samantha, Ezra and I all managed to grab one coach. I looked towards the front of the coach before getting inside and saw something pulling it, normally throughout the rest of the years it’s been pulled magically or so I thought; now it was pulled by a skeletal black horse with reptile like features and leathery wings. I stood there looking at it for a second before Albus saw me looking.  
“Who’d you see die Scorp?” He asked me.  
“What do you mean?” I hadn’t told anybody about what had happened over the summer.  
“It’s a Thestral, they can only be seen by those who have seen death and have accepted it.” Albus said knowingly.  
“Can you see them?” I asked quietly.  
“No, but my dad, mum, aunts, uncles and Rose can.” He said solemnly.  
“How can Rose see them?” I queried  
“I think that’s her story to tell. How can you see them?” Albus asked with a raised eyebrow.  
“My grandfather Lucius passed away over the summer in Azkaban, we were all told to say our goodbyes to him, so being the only child he ever got to meet, me and my father went there to say goodbye along with my grandma Cissy and he passed away not long after we got there.” I wasn’t sad over it, I was never that close to him in all fairness and my other siblings never saw him anyway, as soon as he found out that I had a younger sister he was so angry, he believed that only male heirs should be born to the Malfoy line to carry on the bloodline. Since then my father and mother have barely visited. My grandmother visited him every couple of weeks since that was all the Ministry allowed her, sometimes she would bring me with her, sometimes she would go on her own.   
I finally got into the coach and the Thestral began moving, everybody was still talking about their holidays and how this year was going to be awful since it’s our N.E.W.T year. The only bonus for me this year is that fact I don’t have to share a dorm room anymore I get my own common room and own room.   
Getting out of the coach and going into the Great Hall was more effort than it was worth, children of all ages running around greeting friends they didn’t get to see on the train who were at different house tables. Looking around currently I saw Albus had gone over to the Ravenclaw table to say hello to a Scamander twin, I never remember which is which anyway. He also happened to say hello to my sister Phoenix and the twins Lynx and Lyra before he left to come back over to the Slytherin table which is at the far end of the hall. Ravenclaw is the next table over with Gryffindor next to it and then Hufflepuff at the other far end of the room.   
Looking over towards the Gryffindor table I spot Rose sitting there with her friends laughing at something the metamorphagus one said, I believe her name is Bella or something. It’s as if she can feel somebody watching her because she looks around and spots me looking a scowls, so to annoy her further I wink at her. She goes bright red whether that is through embarrassment or anger I will never know.   
Everybody who was not at their house table goes back to it as the double doors at the front open with Professor Longbottom leading in all the firsties. The stall with the Sorting Hat stands at the front of the room and everybody is silent waiting for it to sing.   
“You may just see a dusty old hat,  
But I am here to tell you where you belong,  
So trust me whilst you sit on this stall,  
Because I assure you I am never wrong;

You may not agree with my choice,  
But I see qualities you may not know,   
For I look into your mind,  
And notice the traits that it may show;

You may belong to Gryffindor,   
Where they are Chivalrous and brave,   
They also value nerve and daring,   
To make sure they never cave;

You may be a Hufflepuff,  
The house with the most kindness and patience,  
For they value loyalty and dedication,   
And they are beyond gracious;

If Ravenclaw is the house for you,  
Knowledge, wit and intelligence is what they measure,   
For only the smartest enter this house,   
And they of course will be a treasure; 

Or maybe you are better suited to Slytherin,  
They are cunning and resourceful,   
Driven by ambition to succeed above all,   
They do what they need and are never remorseful;

So put me on your Head!  
And trust you are in safe hands and don’t be scared,  
For I am the Sorting Hat,  
And I always come prepared.”

Once it had finished its song everybody clapped, even be it half-heartedly, and the sorting began.   
“Barnes, Sarah” Professor Longbottom called. A small girl with short brown hair walked up to the stall and sat down.  
“Hufflepuff” The hat shouted. Sarah immediately got down and walked over to her house table.  
“Barnes, Sloan”   
“Ravenclaw” The hat said.  
“Well, that’s obviously a pair of twins been split up again. It’s going to be like the Scamander twins all over again.” Albus said to me from beside me.  
“Let’s just hope they don’t make as much trouble as the Scamander twins. You know how many detentions they got last year, although, nobody can beat James and Fred’s record detentions they got during sixth year.” I said snickering. Albus was the ‘good’ brother, by all accounts. It’s not that he’s a brownnoser, it’s just he is better at not getting caught, he also isn’t much of a prankster, he just causes trouble in general.   
The sorting continued on with a hell of a lot more students. We had a Boswell and a Carrow join the ranks of the Slytherin of course.   
After about 40minutes, we were finally dwindling down to the last of the new firsties.   
“Weasley, Tobias” Longbottom called, although he seemed slightly confused.  
“Weasley? There’s more of you lot?” I asked turning to Albus.  
“Yeah, they’re my Uncle Charlie’s kids from Romania. They’ve been living there since they were born and they got accepted into Hogwarts so Uncle Charlie and his wife Corina decided that they’d move here.” Albus whispered as he watched his younger cousin Tobias walk up to the sorting hat. He didn’t have the standard ginger hair of the Weasley family; he had dark brown more like auburn hair similar to his cousin Roses’ hair.   
“Okay, have any of you ever met them before this year because you have never mentioned them nor have they ever been to the Burrow when I was there.” I asked still watching the boy sitting on the stall; it was taking an awfully long time to sort him.   
Finally the hat shouted “Ravenclaw!” at the top of its lungs and off walked Tobias to an ecstatic Ravenclaw house.   
“Weasley, Adelina-Grace” Professor Longbottom said.   
“There are two!” I whisper yelled.   
“Yes now shut up.”  
“Ravenclaw.” The hat shouted, there was obviously no doubt about the sister being sorted.   
And finally Daniel Whittard was sorted into Hufflepuff.   
Headmistress Leyson then stood up and went to the podium in front of the teachers table and began speaking.   
“Welcome new students and welcome back to old students. I just have a few rules to let you know of.   
First, Weasley Wizard Wheezes products are band. Anybody caught with any in their possession will be given detention.   
Second, The Forbidden Forest is strictly forbidden, unless you are serving detention under supervision of a professor.   
Third, The black lake is not a swimming pool please do not use it as such.  
And Lastly, this is not a rule, but can all students 17 and over please stay after dinner, and can the Head Boy and Girl come up here afterwards also.  
Thank you and good evening.” Professor Leyson said.  
The food appeared and people began to fill their plates.   
“I wonder why she wants students 17 and older to say behind?” Albus asked around some chicken he was eating.  
“I don’t know but I guess we will find out soon.” I say delicately cutting up my piece of chicken. The differences between Albus and I was pretty obvious. He had a huge family, I had two cousins, He’s parents show him affection, my parents don’t tend to show us an abundance of affection, I eat my food like a civilised human being, Albus eats his like a Neanderthal. Yet we were the best of friends and had been since our first day at Hogwarts.  
The meal went by relatively quickly, and soon the younger prefects were showing the first years to the common room. Students 17 and older stayed behind and were gathered onto the two middle tables by instruction of Headmistress Leyson.   
Not long after two Ministry Official came out of one of the side rooms. Along with my Father Draco Malfoy and Roses’ mother Hermione Granger.   
Rose and I looked at one another and then headed down to the front of the Hall. Once there the adults all turned to greet us.  
“Rose, Scorpius, nice to see the both of you.” Draco Malfoy said with a smirk. He was obviously making a joke since he saw me not even six hours ago.  
“Mr Malfoy, Mum, what are you doing here.” Rose asked, never one to beat around the bush.  
“Well sweetheart, it’s rather unfortunate but we can’t allow you to know so if you both go sit down you will be hearing it from us in a moment.” Mrs Granger said with an unhappy look crossing her eyes.  
We nodded and headed back to the table, we had barely sat down before Headmistress Leyson commanded our attention again.   
“Okay, I gathered you all here by request of the Ministry. The Ministry has done a lot of research and has concluded that even though our numbers in the Wizarding World have indeed increased, we have not increased enough to keep the bloodlines fresh, which is producing more squibs. To rectify the issue the Law Enforcement branch was drafted in because of an old Pureblood Law around arranged marriages. This has been modified so that any blood-status can participate if above the age of 17 but under the age of 21, for now at least.” Leyson said looking around at the current student body.   
All of the students were sitting there pretty shocked including myself. So what she is basically telling us is that because of the devastation of the war had on our overall population and that more Squibs are being born, they have brought in a way to make sure every child born is a magical one.   
“The way this works is by mixing blood status groups so to allow the gene pool to become more diverse and to produce magical offspring. I will now hand you over to Mrs Granger for more information.”   
“What Headmistress Leyson said is true. We are arranging marriages for people between the ages of 17 and 21. How we are going to do this is, we are going to provide you with a questionnaire about yourself to which you must answer honestly. The questionnaire is magical so if you write down an incorrect answer it will glow bright red and will delete the answer you gave so that you can write the correct one. Once finished send it back to the Ministry of Magic whereby it will then be analysed and you will be paired with your partner.” Mrs Granger told us. My father then stepped forward and then finished the speech.  
“However, if you already are in a relationship they must be disbanded. You may write down your current partner but you may not have any guarantees that the person you are with will be your chosen partner. How partners are chosen is to do with the questionnaire but also at the Choosing Ceremony, since there may be more than one suitable partner for each person the Choosing Chalice then comes into effect. How this works is each Male will be called up in Alphabetical Order, by year, and then paired with a Female of the same year group who is most suitable to them in personality. This is done by getting the Male to prick his finger with a needle and putting a drop of blood within the Choosing Chalice, and the person who is deemed your most likely partner, her name will shoot out of the Chalice and you will then be magically bonded. Magical Bonds are hard to break and therefore are permanent, so please if placed with somebody you do not like, give it a chance, it would not have chosen you two to be together if it didn’t think you would cope.” My father finished off.  
“Once Bonded, you will then be moved to the Ministry Starter Estate to begin life with your husband and wife, you will be needed to provide a child within the first two years of marriage. Once a child is provided, you will then be allowed to leave the Ministry Starter Estate to begin a life as a family wherever you wish, you are however allowed to stay on the Estate for as long as you wish. The Bonding Ceremonies will start in April and end in May. It is all done in one single day, for each graduated year, and they will already be living on the Ministry Starter Estate by the time you graduate. Good Luck” Mrs Granger said, she waved her wand and questionnaires then flew towards us. “You are not required to fill them out now, you can fill them out in your own time, however they must be completed and sent back to the Ministry by the 29th September to be ready for the Monday to get analysed.” She said everybody put their questionnaires in their robe pockets without even looking at them. Once that was done we were dismissed and Rose and I headed towards our private Dorms in silence after saying goodbye to our friends.   
Once there we just sat in front of the fire not even taking notice of our common room, just thinking silently.   
We were going to have to get married by the end of the year. Possibly to somebody we barely know or even do not like.   
Oh Crap.


	3. The Amortentia Potion

Chapter 3  
ROV

Once I woke up from my disrupted sleep from last night, a gathered my school belongings for the day and went about getting dressed. Once I’d showered and gotten ready, including make-up and doing my hair into rippling waves that just sit down my back.   
I shove all my books and pieces of parchment into my bag, with one piece lingering on the desk. It stares up at me and I try to ignore it, however, it would be better to just get it out of the way.  
I sit at my desk and gather the parchment and some ink and a quill.   
“This Questionnaire is to be completed by 31st of September to be sent back to the Ministry as soon as completed.   
This must be filled out with black ink. Only true answers will show on the parchment. It will glow bright red and delete the previous answer if it is the wrong one. The Questionnaire consists of 20 questions.

1\. Full Name:-  
a. Age:- DOB:-  
b. Blood Status:-  
c. Current Relationship Status:- 

2\. What do you find are your best attributes?  
3\. Are you more of a City or Country person?  
4\. What colour best describes your personality and why?  
5\. What are the most important things you’re looking for in a person?  
6\. What do you like to do for fun?  
7\. Are you a Night Owl or an Early Bird?  
8\. What book are you reading at the moment, if you are reading a book?  
9\. What kind of music do you like?  
10\. What song best sums you up?  
11\. What would you take with you on a deserted island?  
12\. What is the most reckless thing you’ve ever done?  
13\. What makes you laugh?  
14\. What is your favourite meal?  
15\. What is the most adventurous thing you’ve ever done?  
16\. Do you have a party trick? If you do please explain.  
17\. Exploring or Lazing on the beach?  
18\. If you were granted three wishes by a Genie, what would they be and why?  
19\. What is your best joke?  
20\. What is the best or cheesiest chat up line you have used or heard?”

I read through the questions. I guess some of those would tell you who would be better suited to whom. I began filling in my information. I turned to look at the clock and saw I only had twenty minutes to get down to the Hall for breakfast and then down to the dungeons for Potions. I guess I could answer the questions later.   
Heading down the stairs to my private common room – which I only have to share with one other person – I finally take some notice on how it looks, it’s a mix between Gold, Silver, Green and Red. There were two single arm chairs in front of the fire, one green, one red. There was a fantastic desk over one side of the room in the half that was split into a miniature library. I would definitely be doing my homework over there.   
After having a little mooch around, and finding bell to summon a house elf from the kitchen – my mother would hate that. I went down to the great hall. It didn’t take me as long to get there as I thought it would, since now I’m not in a tower. I headed over towards my friends in the middle of Gryffindor table, and all of them looked a bit worse for wear.  
“You guys okay?” I asked, which cause a few to groan.  
“No, we decided to have a drink last night, all the 17 year olds and we got slightly carried away.” Jonathan Wood said, although he seemed the best out of all of them, apart from of course Belle, who took a lot of effort to get drunk due to her metamorphagus genes.   
“Well it serves you right, it’s not for another eight months yet until our lives are officially over, may as well enjoy this whilst we can.” I say, fortunately I’m not one of the people who are currently in relationships and have to ‘disband’ them as Mr Malfoy said. I don’t envy them at all.   
Reaching down and grabbing a toasted bagel I put some patè on it and then stood up to head to Potions, Professor Jex was a fairly nice woman but since she was the head of Slytherin house she was also very strict when it came down to lateness.  
“I’m heading to potions whose coming?” I asked Belle raised her hand and stood up as did Frankie, Lysander and Jonathan, Xavier didn’t get high enough marks he only managed to get an Acceptable but you needed at least an Exceeds Expectations to be able to continue potions to N.E.W.T Level. But since I already knew that I wanted to work with Potions, this and Herbology were the only subjects that I absolutely needed, the others were just as a backup in case my desired career fails to take off.  
Belle grabbed an apple before leaving and shoved it into her bag, knowing she would get hungry between now and lunch. Always eating that girl, never putting on any weight, not that you’d know of course she’d just morph it away. We all walked down to the dungeons in relative silence. Once there we stood in silence until the rest of the class turned up. Scorpius, Albus, Gerard, Darius, Samantha and Esmeralda showed up from the Slytherin’s. Noticing my sour mood, Malfoy decided to be a good boy and keep his mouth shut, either that or he wasn’t in the mood to fight either.   
Professor Jex sits down on top of her desk, considering she is a professor you’d think she’d sit behind it but she never does. She waits for her NEWT Level students to sit down and then begins the class.  
“Today students we will be making some advanced level potions. Each pair will have a different potion, which of course means that you will be on your own. These are your pairs” She says pointing at the blackboard and names appeared next to one another.   
‘Malfoy – Weasley  
Potter – Nott  
Zabini – Thistle   
Wood – Slughorn’ and the list goes on. Of course Malfoy and I would get paired together.   
I grumble and mutter to myself as I move over to Malfoy’s table.   
“Now, the potions you will now make will be next to your names…” Professor Jex then waves her wand again at the board.   
‘Malfoy – Weasley – Amortentia   
Potter – Nott – Felix Felicis  
Zabini – Thistle – Draught of Living Death  
Wood – Slughorn – Veritaserum  
Scamander – Skeeter – Wolfsbane  
Greengrass-Page – Dolling – Skele-Grow  
Pucey – Longbottom – Hate Potion’  
“Some of these potions will take longer than others, once you have finished your potion I need you to write me a two foot essay on the pros and cons of these potions. You may begin.”   
I opened my Potions book open to the Amortentia Potion and began by putting my cauldron on the heater. Malfoy also had his book open and went to get the ingredients for the potion.   
We managed to get about half way through before we were at each others throats. It said to slice the rose petals that went into the potion but I decided to finely chop them.  
“That’s not what it says to do Weasley.” He practically hisses at me.  
“Just trust me Malfoy, it’ll speed up the process of the potion.” I sigh back like he’s some simpleton.   
“Okay, but if you mess this up I’m going to hex you to the moon and back Weasley.” He growled at Me.  
I added the finely chopped Rose petals and then lowered the heat on the potion to counterbalance the fact I’d finely chopped them. After that I noticed the potion turning a beautiful lilac colour which meant all we needed to do was add the Ashwinder Eggs and then it’d turn to the right colour.   
We could already smell faintly the smell of the things we find most attractive. For example, I smelt, the smell the aroma of many flowers merged together like you would have in a greenhouse, the smell of a burning fire, the smell of sandalwood aftershave… and the smell of the Quidditch pitch.   
Nobody I was close to wore sandalwood aftershave, so who did? I was wracking my brains for who smelt like that when Malfoy leaned closer to me and added the Ashwinder Egg and then I noticed it, Malfoy smelt like sandalwood. Oh Circe I’m attracted to Malfoy.   
But I can’t be. I was mulling this over in my head when Professor Jex comes over to inspect our potion.  
“Oh you’ve finished it already, it looks fantastic, yes. I smell wild flowers, the ocean, wet dogs and car petrol fumes.” She said nodding. Malfoy and I just looked at one another as they are a very odd combination of smells.  
“Professor, why do you smell those particular smells?” Malfoy asked politely.   
“Well, I’ll tell you why I smell those if both of you tell me what you two smell?” She said with a raised eyebrow, we both nodded.  
“I can smell, the fresh smell of flowers in a greenhouse, the smell of a burning fire, sandalwood aftershave and the Quidditch Pitch.” I said blushing profusely, damn my Weasley genes. Professor Jex smiled at me and then turned to Malfoy.   
“And you Mr Malfoy?” Professor Jex asked with a raised eyebrow.   
“I can smell, Lavender and Rose shampoo, the smell of the grounds in the summer by the lake, the smell of new parchment and chocolate frogs.” Malfoy said blushing slightly too.   
Wasn’t my shampoo Lavender and Rose scented…   
“Well thank you for answering, now, the reason I smell those particular scents is because it’s how I met my husband. He’s a Muggleborn wizard, so he knows about muggle things. I was out one summer afternoon walking my two dogs, through a meadow that happened to lead onto a beach, so I went onto the beach and my two dogs ran off and into the ocean, it just so happened that my future husband was sitting on the beach reading something for work. My dogs barrelled into him without a care in the world and headed off into the ocean, never minding that they knocked all the papers from his hands. I ran over to help him get them, and he just scrambled to get them. I noticed one of the headlines was about the vote for the new Minister For Magic, once I realised he was a wizard to I summoned all of his belongings over to me and handed them back. We got to talking about things and then he headed back to his car, but not before offering to drive me and my wet dog’s home.” Professor Jex said with a huge smile on her face. She looked so happy.   
“That’s a lovely story Professor. Does the potion always refer to who you are in love with or just smells that appeal to you?” Malfoy said.  
“Well, that’s something that the department of mysteries is still trying to find out. We cannot be sure as to whether it shows what we like to smell or things that are associated with the one person we do love. However, I will admit, the smell of wet dog is not the most appealing.” Professor Jex said laughing as she walked off to inspect some more of the potions.  
Malfoy and I just sat there waiting for the class to be dismissed both in our own thoughts.  
So Professor Jex doesn’t like the smell of wet dog – but then again who does – but that’s what she smells when she inhales Amortentia, which means it must be smells that you associate with the person you are attracted to not necessarily the smells that you prefer to smell.   
I wonder what everybody else smells when they breath in this particular potion.   
“would anybody else like to take a whiff of the Amortentia?” Professor Jex asked, a few looked slightly dubious at first but Albus was the first to trudge over.   
Albus bent over the potion and sniffed. He smiled to himself slightly then walked away.   
“What did you smell Mr Potter?” The Professor asked intrusively.   
“I smelt the greenhouses, strawberry bubble-gum, and a summer breeze and blueberry pie.” He said smiling, but Albus hates blueberry pie…   
Before she could ask who he thought it might be the bell went for the end of class, disappointing some people because they wanted to smell who their true love might be.  
Having a free period I walked around the grounds of the school, mainly towards the Lake, there was a lovely Willow tree that I loved to sit under and read down there, it was my quiet place, however, a lot of my family knew about this one so I had a few dotted around the school for if I wanted to escape.   
Sitting by the lake with my legs crossed in front of me in silence with a light breeze blowing over me sending my curly waist length red hair back over my shoulders, made me remember that this is the last year being here. It’s sad really, once I leave here there is nothing protecting me from anything that happens outside of this school.   
Mulling that over in my head I failed to notice somebody walk by the lake also in thought, I should have noticed the bright blond hair but I failed to comprehend who it was.  
Lost in my own thoughts I sat down by the lake until it was dark, realising that I had missed my classes and dinner I headed straight up to my dorm room muttering to myself at how much of an idiot I am for smelling Malfoy in the Amortentia potion, I got changed into some pyjamas and then went straight to sleep.


	4. Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them

Chapter 4  
SPOV  
It had been a couple of days since the whole Amortentia incident and Rose and I hadn't spoken a word to one another. It seemed like she was avoiding me. She skipped classes for the rest of Monday and I didn't see her until Tuesday morning, by which time her entire family – that was still residing at Hogwarts at least – were absolutely fuming at her for disappearing, they had looked everywhere and couldn't find her at all.  
Even I was roped into helping.  
Turns out, she was still by the Lake but had cast a Disillusionment charm on herself so that nobody could find her. It was easier than walking to the Slytherin Dorm and stealing Al's Invisibility Cloak.  
Her friends were not pleased with her and neither were Al and Lily, Hugo however, wasn't all that bothered. He knew she'd turn up sooner or later, although he was betting on her being in the Library. His reasoning was she would go somewhere warm and secluded to be on her own. Which made sense, but if she was avoiding people, why would you go to the first place they'd look... That's right, you wouldn't since logic dictates that you'd avoid the obvious places which is exactly what she did.  
Frankie then suggested to Al once Rose had turned up to write to James about getting the Marauders Map, so that if anything like this happened again, we could just look on there to find the person – as long as they were on Hogwarts grounds that was. How she knew about it was a mystery but she did.  
He wrote to James and he sent it the next morning siting why he didn't know why he had it in the first place. That went straight into Al's trunk along with his Invisibility Cloak.  
Once everybody had gotten over Rose's disappearing act they left her be, which is why now I'm heading down to the Lake for some peace and quiet on a Thursday morning wondering what the hell is happening. I still hadn't come to terms with the fact that the Love Potion obviously thinks I have feelings towards Rose of all people let alone that she disappeared for nearly a whole day and I was inwardly freaking out, trying to make some form of sense about our shared predicament.  
I sat on the platform just looking out over the lake. I was sitting there for about 10minutes before I noticed Hagrid head over to the lake. He threw in something large and a giant tentacle shot out of the water and grabbed it making me jump.  
"Sorry Malfoy didn't see yeh there. Yeh okay Malfoy? Seem a bit outta sorts." Hagrid asked me.  
"Yeah, I'm fine Hagrid… Actually, can I ask you something?" I said turning towards Hagrid leaning over the platform edge.  
"Sure go ahead" Hagrid said nodding.  
"Where are the Thestral's kept?" I said randomly looking anywhere but Hagrid's sad face.  
"Ah Malfoy, sorry abou' yer loss. Guessin' yeh saw em on the way in aye?"  
"Yeah, I just wanted to see them, you know. I want to know why you can only see them after death…" I said trailing off.  
"Some people say it's 'cause people need ter see somethin' beau'iful after they've seen somethin' horrific… I can take yeh to em if yeh want?" Hagrid said with a smile, I think he was trying to cheer me up, or maybe he noticed I had something on my mind that I'd rather get rid of.  
"Yeah please Hagrid." I said back standing and following him to the Forbidden Forest.  
"Jus' gotta stop off at meh hut firs' Malfoy." He shouted back heading over there anyway, I just continued walking towards the forest at a slower pace, he caught up with me fairly quickly and I began following him again.  
Not long after we reached a paddock but continued past it once I saw it was a herd of Unicorns.  
"There is abou' 30 Unicorn's in this 'erd nearly one o' the biggest in Europe, the Thestral's are pretty close at soon ter be 24." Hagrid said walking straight past the Unicorns paddock which basically was just a picket fence was surrounding an abundance of trees with a couple of access gates dotted around.  
We continued walking for another couple of minutes before we reached a darker section of the forest. I heard them before I could see them, their wings flapping around.  
"They 'ave great senses, they've heard meh since before we reached the Unicorns." Hagrid said smiling; he obviously likes the Thestral's too.  
We reached the paddock not long after and entered the gate, he began pointing out certain ones.  
"That one there is called Thantos; she is the leader o' the 'erd." Hagrid said looking at a slightly older looking Thestral.  
"Who's that one over there?" I said pointing at the one I recognised from pulling my coach, the reason I recognised her was because she had a chunk out of her left wing.  
"Oh tha' is Kali and next teh her the pregnant mare is Lila her daughter, and Lila's mate Viduus is over there. Was she the one to pull yeh carriage 'ere?"  
"Yeah she was. Can I stroke her?"  
"Yeah, figured yeh'd say tha', so I brough' this." He said reaching into a satchel that I didn't noticed he had a pulled out a big slab of raw meat, he handed me it and told me to throw it to Kali.  
I threw it to her and to my great surprise she gobbled it up straight away, sharing some with her pregnant daughter. She then came over to see if we had anymore and I reached out to stroke her, she was surprisingly smooth, stroking her long mane and her muzzle she closed her eyes and huffed. I blew on her nose slightly remembering from when I was younger and my mother took me and Phoenix whilst she was pregnant with the twins to a farm, the farmer said if you blow on their noses and they blow back it means they like you.  
Not knowing how true it was I did it anyway.  
Kali blew back some air at me and lifted her nose to get me to stroke her more. I took an instant liking to her, mainly because she was the first Thestral that I had seen, but also because she just had a beautifully friendly nature.  
"I don't understand how you guys get such a bad reputation… except of course only being able to be seen after somebody has seen and accepted death."  
"Don' help tha' they are attracted ter the smell o' blood neither." Hagrid mumbled under his breath in answer, I just shrugged, that didn't matter, they eat meat, of course they're going to be attracted by the smell of blood.  
We stayed there for another 10minutes before Hagrid went all teacher on me and said it's getting close to my next lesson – we had been here during my free period and the first break – so we heading back out of the forest.  
I had a double lesson of Transfiguration so I hurried to that since the teacher is Professor Boot who also happens to be Deputy Head of the school, so he is fairly strict on Students who happen to be late to class.  
I manage to get there just in time before he stepped out of his office and entered the class room, the only free seat however was next to Rose's friend Belle who hated me, I might have something to do with the fact that I used to call her Bella…  
"Good afternoon class, right now I know we had a double lesson Tuesday morning, but I wanted to see how everybody faired. Now that I know everybody's strengths and weaknesses I have put in seating plan into effect so that those who are more confident can work together and not have somebody drag them down or them just carry the weaker person along. Please can everybody come up here and see where you will be sitting for the rest of the year please." Professor Boot said to which I moaned quietly. I knew who I'd be sitting next to simply because we are the smartest in the year. I went up to check anyway and just as I suspected it said;  
Scorpius Malfoy – Rose Weasley – Back seat to the left  
So I moved over towards the back seat, obviously we are back there since he feels like we won't need as much help as some others who are to sit near the front. The next two hours weren't too bad, we had to try and transfigure a mouse into a needle, because, of course we're going to need to do that in the future…  
Rose and I managed to do it within about two minutes of one another so we were both awarded 10 points to both Gryffindor and Slytherin respectively.  
The rest of the lesson was spent doing nothing once we had accomplished it a few times. So Rose decided to try and strike up a conversation.  
"What do you think about this whole Marriage Law, Malfoy?" She whispered to me, everybody else was still concentrating on trying to turn a mouse into a needle with little success.  
"Well, if it gets me out of having to marry Venus Zabini then I'm all for it. That girl is a total bitch." I said mumbling, nobody knew of my arranged marriage to the youngest Zabini which now by the looks of things was cancelled, thank god.  
"You were arranged to be married?" Rose whisper yells obviously shocked.  
"Yes Weasley, it's not uncommon with Purebloods, which is why this Law was brought into effect in the first place. But yes, I was arranged to be married to Venus, now I'm not."  
"But you have sex with everything that moves and has a pulse with boobs." She said smirking.  
"Yes... Point being?" I said smirking back.  
"Point being is that if you're arranged to be married wouldn't you save yourself for your future Wife?"  
"Why would I do that. We don't love each other nor would we ever, she's slept with her fair share of Wizards Rose. I don't see why I need to be a saint when she quite clearly isn't. It was never going to last anyway. She had already mentioned to my sister - idiotically, like my sister wouldn't tell me - that if we got married and no love grew between us, she would just sleep around with other people. She wouldn't care, she's such a bitch she wouldn't think twice about it."  
"At least now you don't have to get married to that complete witch now aye Malfoy. Everything has a silver lining." Rose said with a smirk and laughing.  
"Yes, I guess it does. What about you Weasley?" I ask interested.  
"I don't like the idea of not knowing who I'll marry, but if I don't like them I can always come to an arrangement with my 'husband' similar to what Venus was going to do with you however, it would be mutual otherwise I wouldn't do it. We have to get married and provide a child, it doesn't say it has to be a child from the person whom you're married to… As long as it's a mutual decision then if we both find somebody else to love then that's what happens. I do hope that we learn to love one another though." She said honestly. I would never have thought that Weasley would have condoned cheating…  
"I'm surprised Weasley."  
"Yeah, me to Malfoy. Everybody here deserves to marry for love, not for procreation. I just hope that some people find love from this. Otherwise it will be a waste of time with every marriage being unfaithful to one another and being in loveless marriages." She mumbled to herself.  
"I agree." I said. I hope to find love from this. Granted being a Malfoy means I can be hard to love, the connotations that come with my name making it harder for people. I'm just hoping I get paired with somebody who can see past my name.  
"Guaranteed though, I get paired with somebody who just wants to be with a Weasley. You don't know how hard it is with a name like Weasley or Potter or even Granger to live up to. We are famous. The paparazzi are crawling round every family member 21 and younger to see who they'll be marrying. We are practically a zoo exhibit." She sighed.  
"Yeah, same boat here Weasley. I'm a Malfoy, whoever has to get married to me will be taking the Malfoy name and the awfulness that comes along with being associated with Death Eaters and Dark Arts. My father has tried so hard to rid those feelings and associations, but it'll take a lot more than sending some stray Death Eaters to prison. I feel for the poor Witch who has to take on the name Malfoy without being able to prepare for it." I sigh, this was getting awfully deep for a conversation taking place in a room full of people trying to change mice into needles.  
Rose was quiet for the rest of the lesson contemplating what I said I think.  
Transfiguration finished before we realised and we headed to Lunch, Rose walked with her friends and I walked with Albus. Sitting at the Slytherin table eating some pasta and salad I looked over to Rose who was laughing at something one of her many friends said. The way her face lit up when she laughed and how happy she looked, she caught my eye and continued smiling. I averted my gaze and went back to eating.  
I wish I could make her laugh like that. Even though being friends with Albus and by association her, she never seemed to find me all that funny, she giggled sometimes but never full on laughed and threw her hair back.  
Last lesson today was double charms which went by particularly quickly, Professor Flitwick had us doing half theory half practical lesson today. I was barely concentrating though and thinking about my earlier conversation with Rose… We were both in the same boat. Whoever married either of us was either going to love the fact or hate it. The amount of attention they would get for getting married to a Malfoy or a Weasley would either set them up to fail or to succeed.  
The only person who would be okay with being able to deal with the last name Malfoy would have to be a strong willed, self-assured and confident person who more than likely had already learned to deal with the stigma having an infamous last name to live up to.  
Thinking through people in our year group of women who fit that description the only person who sprang to mind was the red head in question.  
Let's just hope the Choosing Ceremony doesn't put me with somebody who couldn't handle the pressure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A.N:- Hello, thanks for reading.  
> If anybody has any questions or anything please ask me either on here on on Tumblr just search for StupendousMysticWerewolf or LoveAlwaysWins and it should come up.  
> All questions will be answered over there as well as updates on Chapters and whatnot.  
> Thank you,  
> SMW


	5. Laughing With Malfoy? What The Hell!

Chapter 5  
Rose POV

The past few months have gone by fairly uneventfully; it was now November and was about two days away from the first Quidditch game of the season. Gryffindor was playing Slytherin and then in two weeks Hufflepuff plays Ravenclaw.   
Scorpius has barely been around, even for Head meetings, although we do bump into each other in the shared common room. I can also hear some very disturbing noises coming from Scorpius’ bedroom every now and again which I cast a Muffliato spell on his door, because he obviously doesn’t care about my eardrums or sanity to do it himself.   
Scorpius is on the Slytherin Quidditch team with Albus who happens to be Captain, has been having them practice at every free opportunity they have, whether that be with the whole team or just together. Albus wants to get the Quidditch Cup for his last year as Captain; well the same can be said for our Captain Jonathan Wood since it’s his last year also.   
When I wasn’t at Quidditch Practice though I was either studying or down in the Dungeons. I am a pretty proficient Potion maker; I managed to accidentally create a Lust Potion that if left to ferment it becomes a Sexual Stimulant if consumed in small amounts, in large amounts it becomes something completely different I won’t even get into it, just know that it’s now an illegal substance within the school if sold in bottles over 0.5ml.   
I was now trying to find a cure for Lycanthropy through the use of the Wolfsbane Potion. Since Wolfsbane Potion can relieve some of the symptoms of Lycanthropy, I’m hoping through studying it, I can find a cure for it. Whether that will happen or not is a completely different story.   
I came up with the idea of finding a cure for Lycanthropy after seeing my Uncle Bill and my cousins Victoire, Dominique and Louis during a full moon. Although not actual Werewolves, since Bill was just scratched not bitten it results in him having Wolf like tendencies, such as liking raw meat and getting pretty agitated on a Full Moon. His children however, have inherited the wolfish tendencies also; they like their father prefer rarer meat, although not as rare as their father, and also can get very irritable during a Full Moon. I know he isn’t a full werewolf, nor are his children but if I can get the right concoction to get rid of their symptoms then I can modify that one to create a cure.  
At least, that’s the idea.  
That’s why I was currently squirreled away in the Dungeons, hoping to stay clear of Jonathan and Albus. I must have been there for at least an hour and half with no progress at all on my Wolfsbane Potion 2.0 as I was currently dubbing it until I actually worked it out, before somebody happened across me.   
“Rose, I’ve been looking for you everywhere!” Belle said to me as she walked straight into the classroom with the door banging off the wall creating a horrible noise causing me to jump and drop to many beetle eyes into the potion causing it to bubble viciously.  
“Oh shit!” I shouted as I turned the heat down to slow down the bubbling. I never stopped a potion since I was experimenting with ingredients anyway.   
“Sorry Rose, but I’ve been looking everywhere for you!” Belle said again, I nodded for her to go ahead and explain whilst I looked over the potion.  
“So I was in the Great Hall and the Slytherin Quidditch team had just come in from practice and Al and Scorpius had just sat down when Venus Zabini walked over towards them with a letter in hand and passed it to Scorpius who read it and went ballistic saying that there was no way he was putting her down as his current girlfriend since it wasn’t true anyway so that he would have to marry her. She just got the arse and walked away. I just thought it was odd…” She said obviously wanted her view point.  
“Not really, there was meant to be a marriage between both Venus and Scorpius. He doesn’t like her anyway, thinks she’s a complete cow, he told me that he was pleased this law has come into effect so that he doesn’t have to marry her.” I said offhandedly without any thought as to whether that was meant to be private or not.   
“Seriously? And Malfoy doesn’t want that? Wow, I would have thought marrying a pureblood would be right up his street, apparently not.” Belle said with a little snort.   
“Well, we will see who he marries soon anyway. Just another six months until we get married to somebody we probably have barely spoken to… You know what I might do, Belle. We are only going to marry somebody of the same age and year group right?” I asked.  
“Yeah I think so, because everybody else has their Ceremony’s before us.” She answered back with her head tilted to the side, her bright pink hair falling over her shoulder. “Why?”  
“Because what if we did something like a speed dating type affair so that everybody can meet each other and can get to know people so they’re not completely marrying strangers in a few months.” I said with a smile, whilst waiting for her to consider the proposition I checked my potion and it had calmed down considerably.   
“You’d have to pass it by Headmistress Leyson and by the Heads of House, and then Scorpius, but I think that it would be a great idea. At least that would mean that we can get to know everybody a little better. Hang around with people outside of our normal groups of friends and whatnot, plus we will all be living on the same Estate so we may as well get to know our future neighbours to I guess.” Belle said excitedly, her hair turned a bright yellow. I was so used to her hair changing colour with her moods I barely took notice unless it was an uncommon colour.   
“Anyway Belle, I’m trying to concoct a potion here so can I find you and Frankie later?” I asked, not wanting to be rude but I prefer working alone.  
“Yeah sure, Frankie isn’t feeling great, the stress about the Game I think. We will see you later.” Belle said hugging me and turned and left the room.   
I was in the room about another hour before I got disturbed again. This time it wasn’t a friend more like a frenemy. Scorpius Malfoy walked through the door rubbing his eyes with a Potions book under his arm.   
It took him a couple of minutes whilst he placed his book on a bench and grabbed a cauldron and began heating it up before he realised the room wasn’t empty.   
“Oh, Hello Weasley, sorry didn’t see you there.” He said tiredly.  
“Malfoy, it’s okay. It’s just a classroom.” I said smiling towards him; it looks like he’s had a tough day of it already, his hair was still wet from the shower he must have had after Practice.  
“What’re you doing? The Potions assignment?” He asked, I shook my head and showed him the vial with the Potion we were assigned on the table, I finished that ages ago.  
“Working on a Potion…” I said leaving it hanging; the only ones who know what I am doing are Frankie, Belle, Albus, Uncle Bill and Victoire, Nicki and Louis.   
“Okay… Well, could you maybe help me with the Potions assignment I’m utterly useless at Potions.” He asked practically begging. I nodded saying I’d help if he needed it.  
“What would Severus Snape say?” I said under my breath sniggering. He didn’t hear me and continued working silently for about 15minutes before the first of many curses came out of his mouth.  
“Oh fuck.” He groaned. I walked over checking what happened and peered into the potion, he had stirred it clockwise to many times.   
“Counter it by adding one more Lace Wing and stirring once anticlockwise before adding the Jobberknoll feathers to your memory potion.” I advised. He looked at me with a raised eyebrow but didn’t say anything and did as I said. It corrected itself and went to the colour it was meant to.   
“Thanks Rose, how did you get so good at Potions?” Scorpius asked me, obviously not realising he had said my first name and not the standard ‘Weasley’ he always calls me even though he knows my surname is ‘Granger-Weasley’.  
“I don’t know really… I just had a knack for it.” I answered looking down.  
Scorpius nodded and didn’t say anything further and continued with his potion. With the renewed silence I went back to my Wolfsbane 2.0 and saw that it was pretty much the same colour as a normal Wolfsbane Potion even though things had changed. Hmm… maybe I’m on the right track.  
Taking down some notes using a Muggle notepad and pen – so things were quicker, why wizards haven’t caught up to the fact that we can now use pens rather than quills and ink I do not know… The people still live in the goddamn dark ages I swear.   
We stayed silent for a while whilst I took notes of my potion. After about 10minutes his potion just needed to brew for about 45minutes so he came over to inspect mine.  
“Is that Wolfsbane?” He asked curiously. I was quite impressed that he knew what it was by sight. Many people didn’t. We didn’t even study it in school until the last term before our N.E.W.Ts.   
“Yes, why?” I sighed.  
“No reason… just wondered why you’re making a potion for Werewolves…” He pondered.   
“I’m making it for my Uncle if you must know.” I answer; it was common knowledge to anybody who read a Wizarding history book that covered the war that my Uncle Bill was scratched by a Werewolf.   
“Oh… okay. But wouldn’t he get that on a prescription from the apothecary?” He said, Merlin can’t he just leave it alone.  
“Yes, but sometimes they’re late. So I make one just in case and send it…” I was practically turning beetroot from the fact that that was the worst lie ever. He was looking at me like I was bullshitting… which I was.   
“Allrighhht… whatever you say Weasley, anyway my Potion needs to boil for another 35minutes mind watching it whilst I go to the kitchens and get a drink and a snack… I’ll bring you something back if you want?” Malfoy offered. Why was he being nice to me? Yes okay we hung out on occasion but it was normally filled with snarky comments and sarcasm. None of that seemed present at the moment… But I was thirsty and pretty hungry.   
“Yeah can I have a Butterbeer and a roast chicken and bacon sandwich with mayonnaise please?”   
“Sure. Be right back.” He nodded as he left the room.   
Scorpius was only gone for about ten minutes before he was back with food. He came in carrying a picnic basket. I raised my eyebrows at him.   
“Don’t look at me like that, when I said it was for you an Elf named Winky decided to shove as much food and drink into here.” Malfoy said with a snicker.  
Opening the basket I started to unload so much food, Panini’s, strawberries dipped in chocolate, four bottles of Butterbeer, chicken salad, my roast chicken and bacon sandwich and a few other bits.   
“Did you tell her we were on a date or something?” I said laughing.  
“No, I just said we were working together and we got hungry could I have some food and drinks to take back. She was very helpful though.” He said laughing; well obviously she was with the amount of food and drink she supplied for us. Shrugging I leant towards the Panini’s, I picked up a ham and cheese one, it was still warm. It was the epitome of delicious.   
“Since you’re here though, I want to ask your opinion.” I said looking down.  
“Sure go ahead…” He trailed off biting into a strawberry.   
“Well I had an idea earlier, it still needs things worked out and changed to actually work, but it should be okay. So I was talking to Belle earlier and we were talking about the arranged marriages. I was saying about how marrying a stranger would be awful. Then I came up with the idea of making sure everybody isn’t a stranger – to an extent at least anyway – why not set up a sort of speed dating type affair where we get paired with a certain male and female for a few days during the week and go on a ‘date’ so that we can break the ice between everybody and at least they know something about the other?”   
“Sounds okay, but who do you think will go for it, I know a few Slytherin’s won’t. They’re against this anyway; they won’t do anything that will make it any easier. They want it to fail.” Scorpius mentioned.  
“I don’t know Scorp, but it’s worth a try to rid the tension between everybody.”  
He nodded. He knew I was right after all, and continued to eat his strawberries.   
We stayed in companionable silence which for us was strange to say the least, we normally at least bickered or argued.   
“What did you put on your Questionnaire?” I asked to make conversation.  
“I can’t remember it was back in September, its November now.” He said whilst running his hand through his hair and then rubbed the back of his neck “Do you remember?”   
“Yeah, I wrote them down somewhere. Thought the questions would come in handy. Maybe we should make questions for each pair to ask each other whilst out on their dates – as well as a few others of course – to see who are the closest pairs, then that might give us a clue as to who could be paired together…”   
“Good idea. Should we start with ourselves and work from there?” Malfoy asked, I nodded and began delving in my bag for the bit of parchment I wrote the questions on, as well as my answers, which I had written on the back.   
It took me a good minute or so to find the paper which was crumbled at the bottom of my bag but I flattened it out and cast a Gemini spell on it to duplicate it for Scorpius.   
We both filled out our answers again as close as we could remember them being at least. After fifteen minutes we had both finished and began to ask each other questions.   
“Okay so the first question is what your best attributes are? I wrote that my hair is a nice shade of red and my eyes are a pretty shade of blue. My hardworking nature is also a pretty good attribute too. What about you?”   
“Hardworking, Handsome and funny.” Scorpius answered me, I rolled my eyes at his answer of course he’d call himself handsome, not just point out nice features and be done with it.   
“Okay are you a night owl or early bird?” I ask rubbing the back of my neck and my hand from hurting. I pull my curly auburn hair to the top of my head and tie it in a knot; I put my wand through it to hold it in place since I don’t have a hair tie. A few tendrils escape and frame my face quite nicely.   
“I’m definitely a night owl, what about you?”   
“Same, that’s when I prefer to write. It’s quiet and peaceful.”   
Scorpius nods and scans through the questionnaire some more, “What is the cheesiest chat up line you’ve heard/said?” he said laughing.  
“I can’t remember who said it, but it was when I was out with my cousin Dominique the summer before Sixth year, and we went out to the club in Diagon Alley ‘The Vault’ but they said and I quote ‘I must have had some Felix Felicis, because I think I'm about to get lucky’, which was the worst thing anybody has ever said to me.” I started laughing just remembering that moment, Malfoy looked at me with raised eyebrows and I nodded at him to tell me his one.  
“Well one girl who’s left now thank god said to me, ‘If I was to look into the Mirror of Erised, I'd see the two of us together’ which was actually fairly creepy. I still sometimes get nightmares from that.  
“Well at least she didn’t ask if you were going to bed and if she could Slyther-in?” I said with a chuckle.  
“I would have preferred that to what she said, the look on her face was like she’d planned our wedding and the names of our future children.” He grumbled doing an exaggerated shiver to prove his point in how violated he must have felt.   
“Okay let’s continue… What’s your best Joke?” I asked him trying not to smile; I’ve never heard him crack a joke before so this should be pretty funny.   
“Okay… Why did the Hufflepuff charm her hair blonde?”  
“I don’t know Malfoy, why did she charm her hair blonde?”   
“To look intelligent.” He said sniggering; I was trying to hold back a laugh, not because the joke was funny but because it was awful. “Okay your turn”   
“Fine, but don’t judge me, it’s the only one I can remember… Where do you find Dumbledore’s Army?” Scorpius stayed silent but waited for the punch line “Up his sleevy…”   
Scorpius sat there pretty still for a moment before bursting out laughing, “That’s the most terrible joke I have ever heard Weasley!” He said through fits of laughter.   
“Yep, I told you it was awful.” I said smiling, it was nice to see him laughing, and it was a very rare occurrence, around me especially.   
“Okay, final one for today, what’s the most reckless thing you’ve ever done?”  
“Okay… So this summer me, Belle and Frankie went to this Body Paint party where it was all Neon and was pretty cool. Anyway, we ended up getting absolutely trashed and somehow ended up at a tattoo and piercing place, I ended up getting my nipple pierced and Belle got a Septum piercing which she has kept she just flips the ring up during school hours and Frankie, well Frankie was the most sober out of all of us so she didn’t get anything done.” I tell him embarrassingly.   
“Y-you got your nipple pierced?” Scorpius stutters in shock with his mouth open and eyes as wide as saucers, yes I guess it’s not something somebody would look at me and think.  
“Yup.” I said popping the ‘p’ “I was drunk, I’ve kept it though, I think it looks sexy.” I started blushing which was strange for me I never normally blush.   
“It sounds hot but not as reckless as me… I loitered underneath a sign that said no loitering once… No not really I’m kidding that would be rubbish. I once went to a Muggle Shopping Centre and played my hand at a ‘Magician’ I got a pretty good crowd going and even made myself some money, about £80 in Muggle money, which transferred over to G135. I never let them see my wand and used smoke screens when I apparated and mainly used wandless magic but it was still fantastic.”   
“You could have broken the Statute of Secrecy you moron! What if you’d been caught! Sounds like a lot of fun though, just never do it again.” I scolded him; I was Head Girl after all.   
“Okay mum.” Malfoy said sarcastically, “Well, my Potion is finally done, so I’m going to go we can meet up later and come up with some more questions about the whole speed dating thing. 8.30pm in the common room sound good to you Weasley?” He asked, whilst putting his potion in a vial and tidying up his things.   
“Yes, sounds good to me then we can pitch it to Headmistress Leyson tomorrow after dinner if we sort out the finer points first.”   
“Sounds good, see you later Weasley.” He said with a nod.  
“Yeah see you later…” I whispered, he’d already left the room though and hadn’t heard me.   
Maybe Albus was right, maybe we could get along if we tried. Because, this afternoon wasn’t so bad after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Make sure to Review my lovelies! Also if anybody has Tumblr please look me up under LoveAlwaysWinsInTheEnd, thank you!!


	6. What's A Highlighter, Weasley?

Chapter 6  
Scorpius POV

After I left Granger-Weasley in the Potions classroom I went up to our common room for a little while. I was quite tired after all that training. I just needed to sit down and relax… that was easier said than done when I had a certain redhead on my mind.   
I lay down of my bed and pulled the hangings. I was so tired after training then having to do my potions assignment it didn’t take me long at all to fall asleep.   
I must have slept for at least an hour and was woken up by the sound of giggling coming from the common room downstairs. I got up and tiptoed towards the door so that they wouldn’t realise I was in my room. I opened the door slightly but couldn’t quite hear what they were saying. I grabbed my wand from the table beside the door and said “Accio Extendable Ear” One came flying at me from the bottom of my trunk and I stuck one end in my ear and threaded the other end down the stairs through the tiny gap in my door.  
“- How are we going to sort this out then? Have you talked to Malfoy about it yet?” Rose’s friend Belle asked.  
“Yeah, not long after you left he came into the classroom to do his potions assignment. We discussed it over lunch.” Rose said she was obviously trying to avoid the conversation.   
“You had lunch with Malfoy… Without killing each other! What the heck has changed this year girl, you’re normally hexing his arse off with the brilliant Bat Bogey hex that your Aunt Ginny taught you!” Her other friend Francesca Longbottom said, I couldn’t help but snort at the Bat Bogey hex thing, she throws a decent hex but half the time its after I’ve already hexed her and we both have to go to the hospital wing to get treated by Madam Vane.   
“Yeah I know, I was surprised to. We actually had a lot in common; I’m beginning to think that Albus was right, if we put our differences aside we might actually get on…” Rose trailed off sounding slightly worried.  
“Rose, you know what this means right?” Frankie said and Belle started laughing, “Albus was right and you were wrong!” Frankie then howled with laughter, I will admit that I snorted a little too. Rose doesn’t like being wrong, it’s not something she does.   
“Oh shut up you two!” Rose huffed. I then heard her move and I closed my door a little more in case she came upstairs, “Yes I know I was wrong, but should I tell you what’s worse… We had a good time, we laughed and joked and we actually had a fair amount in common…”   
“Well, at least we know who Rose’s going to marry!” Belle said a started cracking up laughing. I chocked on my own breath and started coughing causing the girls downstairs to stop laughing and be quiet. I quickly dragged the extendable ear back up and threw it under the bed and crawled over to my bed, I had to make it look like I wasn’t listening, and making out I woke up coughing was the best idea.   
The girls ran up the stairs and came into my room, Rose walked in and Belle and Frankie stayed by the door.   
“You okay Malfoy?” Rose inquired whilst walking over to me on my bed and sitting on the edge.   
I just nod because I can’t quite form words just yet. Roses’ friend Belle notices and conjures a glass and some water and hands it to me. I drink the water and it helps stop the coughing fit.  
“Thanks.” I groan out.   
Belle nods and walks back towards the door with Frankie. “Hey Rose, we will be downstairs waiting for you okay?” Frankie says with a smile. Rose sighs and nods her answer and they disappear.   
“So… How much of that did you hear?” Rose questions, she was never one to beat around the bush.   
“Hear what?” I must play dumb. I must play dumb.  
“Don’t play dumb Malfoy.” Shit she knows!   
“Erm… I’m not…?” I answer back; she then gets a frown on her face and starts looking through my pockets and under the bed when my pockets come up empty.   
“Really, then why is there an extendable ear conveniently under your bed?!” She says coming out from under my bed clutching the offending Weasley Wizard Wheezes product in her dainty hand.   
“Oh what a surprise, I lost those ages ago. Thanks for finding it Weasley.”   
“Uh huh. Whatever Malfoy. I’ll talk to you later. I’m going back to my friends.” She says and leaves the room pretty quickly taking the extendable ear with her I might add. Thieving redhead.   
I decided to stay up in my room and continue doing some Charms homework. I had been doing my homework for a good 45minutes before I heard the girls downstairs saying their goodbyes. Which was my cue for being allowed back in MY common room.   
I head downstairs and straight to the kitchenette and ask the fridge for a portion of pancakes, bacon and eggs since I had missed dinner. I had a hankering for it since we went away to America for a holiday/work thing with my sister Carina and her husband Christopher Sayre. Christopher had to visit family and go to Ilvermorny and check up on it since he is a direct descendant to the founder Isolt Sayre.   
I grabbed my pancakes, bacon and eggs and went and sat in front of the fire and ate my delicious pancakes. Rose didn’t take long to come over and sit next to me.  
“Shouldn’t we continue with our earlier conversation?” Rose suggested, I nodded since I had a mouth full of pancake and my parents taught me it was rude to talk with food in my mouth… Unlike Weasley who always shows people her food being partially digested.   
“Okay, I’ll go grab the questions whilst you finish eating and we will start afterwards.” She says as she walks up the stairs to her room.   
She didn’t take too long and I had nearly finished my meal. She sat down next to me and got both of the parchment out which had the questions on and then her answers, I wandlessly summoned my own from upstairs. It’s not too hard to do simple spells without a wand the harder the spells the more energy drains you.   
Anyway I digress.   
Granger-Weasley sits next to me and starts drawing over some of the ones we already answered with a Muggle pen that had a funny nib on it and came out a bright pink colour that was practically neon.   
“What’s that Weasley?” I enquire never having seen one before.  
“It’s called a Highlighter. Muggle’s use this to emphasise certain parts of say a textbook for studying or to stress certain parts of a letter which need addressing. I’m using it to tell me which questions we’ve already answered and ones we don’t want to use.” She says holding up two highlighters, “I’m using the pink one for ones we’ve already answered, and the blue one will be for ones we aren’t using. Leaving the ones we don’t know about blank just in case.” She explains whilst highlighting another question we’ve answered. At the moment the question sheet is just pink, no blue on there as of yet.   
“Okay, so where should we start?” Rose says handing me over the questions. I browse over it and see one I’ve always wanted to know.  
“What are the most important things you’re looking for in a partner?”   
She stays silent for a moment thinking over the question, “Well they have to be able to deal with my mammoth, manic and mischievous family and the expectations that come along with being a part of the Weasley and Potter families. They need to be able to deal with that first, but I’ve already told you that, but that is my biggest requirement. So other than that, I guess they’d just have to be intelligent and up for a good conversation, handsome but not a pretty boy but nice enough to look at, light hair and light eyes, can play Quidditch because I wouldn’t be able to deal with somebody who didn’t like Quidditch, have a good sense of humour and can make me laugh, a lot.” She says biting her lip; she’s embarrassed about telling me.   
“Wow. So nothing in particular aye Weasley? You know, out of all of the guys you’ve dated previously the only person who fits that profile was Lorcan Scamander back in forth year for three months. Other than that you’ve only dated dark haired lads, they might have light eyes but not both. Hmm… is there somebody you like to base these off of or is it just traits you find attractive?” I snigger, what she didn’t realise was she just described me, which was pretty odd because she barely takes notice of me unless I was with Albus.   
“Just traits I find attractive I guess. I saw this movie once with my mum and the main male character in there was so beautiful, I’ve had a crush on him ever since.” She smiles shyly after.  
“What was the movie?” Wondering whether it’s one I had seen…  
“It’s a real old one maybe about 25years, but it’s called The Prince & Me, he must be in his late 40’s by now but he was good looking back then.”   
“Never heard of it…” I shrug.  
“Wouldn’t of thought you had. Anyway, what about you?” She questions. Oh it was my turn now.  
“Well, they’d have to be willing to deal with the Malfoy name. But looks wise, I guess darker hair than me because we don’t want the kids to be albino for Merlin’s sake, light eyes because blue eyes are just beautiful, and again the same as you, I can’t be married to a dunce who can’t have a decent conversation and doesn’t know the difference between a Hippogriff and a Abraxan.” I answer with my signature smirk in place.  
Rose laughs at my answer. She knew I was referring to Destiny Carrow-Flint the complete bint failed her Care of Magical Creatures O.W.L for getting that question wrong.   
We end up asking each other a few more questions before Rose starts yawning. She stretches and snuggles back into the corner of the couch; She is currently writing the answer to the question I just asked her which was, ‘If you were granted three wishes by a Genie what would you wish for and why?’ we had already asked what our favourite meals are, hers is her Grandma Molly’s Roast dinner and mine is my mums Chilli Con Carne. I now know what her favourite music is too, she likes the bands Fire of Wrath and Daughters of Daydreams which are pop rock and indie bands, whereas I like Inferi Maniac and Unknown Lessons which are rock bands. She refused to say what her party trick is whilst going bright red in the face like a tomato.   
I noticed that the scratching of her quill had stopped so I turned round to check and noticed she’d fallen asleep. I looked at the clock and saw it was about 12.30pm. Those four hours went quickly. I got up and went over to her pen and paper and put them on the table in front of her. Once I settled them down I went to bend down and pick her up to take her to her bed. Bending over to pick her up I got my arm behind her back went to put one under her legs to support her weight, I never managed to get that far though because she moved and knocked me off balance so I fell down on the couch next to her and couldn’t move.   
“Really Weasley, I’m trying to stop you from getting a neck ache yet you force me to sit here. Fine, have it your way.” I whisper to myself. I settle down next to Weasley and lay in a way that made my stuck arm more comfortable and closed my eyes. I was pretty tired, and it didn’t take long for me to drift off into slumber. 

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I woke up the next morning with a dead arm and a terrible neck ache. Well at least I can blame Weasley. I go to stretch and notice that I can’t. Opening my eyes I look down onto my chest and notice we are both now lying horizontally with Weasley on top of me with her head on my chest and her hand resting on my chest. It was nice to see Rose laying on me without being hit by her like back in third year.   
We were walking down towards Defence and we were already running late. Walking down a set of stairs she missed a step and used me to try and save her what she didn’t know was that I was in the middle of stepping down a step so my balance was already off kilter. She grabbed onto my collar and we both lost our footing and went tumbling down to the bottom of the staircase.   
Groaning I opened my eyes noticing that I was fortunately still alive and also that there was a redheaded Weasley on me. If this wasn’t every boy in our years fantasy then I don’t know what was – well all those that weren’t related to her, that’s a bit weird. I had been fantasising over this very thing for months. Rose on top of me her cheeks flush and her hair dishevelled. Unfortunately in reality she was still dressed, in my vision she wasn’t. Thinking about her in all of my imaginary naked glory started making my trousers slightly tight and she was in the perfect position to feel that tightness. Shit, think of dead kittens! Grandmother having sex with Grandfather! Anything! Must abort thoughts!   
“Godric that hurt, you okay Malfoy?” She asks whilst sitting up on my thighs and going red when she realises where she is. “Sorry, didn’t mean to land on top of you!”   
“It’s fine Weasley, you can stay there as long as you like” I say with a smirk causing more naughty teenage boy thoughts entering my head and making my cock twitch in anticipation. Rose went from about to laugh to bright red after the twitch. Shit, she felt it.  
“What was that Malfoy?” She stutters  
“What do you think Weasley, it’s not my wand in my pocket and I’m exceptionally happy to see you.” I say sniggering at her.  
“Malfoy you good for nothing Cad!” She shouts at me and starts hitting my chest repeatedly.   
“Sorry Weasley just thought since you landed on top of me that’s what you wanted.” I said whilst grabbing her hands to stop the assault.   
Bright red in the face she got off from me and stalked away from me, and that my friends was the first time I realised that Rose Weasley wasn’t so bad after all.   
She did look so peaceful though so I didn’t want to move her but I was dying for a piss. So I lifted her off my chest very gently. Once I was out from underneath her I feel a sense of emptiness from not having her so close to me anymore. Salazar I’m turning into a pussy.   
I run up to the bathroom and go to the loo and brush my teeth, nobody needs to smell that disgusting morning breath. Even Weasley. I don’t bother getting showered or changed; I just head back downstairs and check on the redheaded bane of my life. She’s still sound asleep but it won’t be long until she wakes up. So I go upstairs and grab myself a change of clothes and get dressed, I’ll shower later, it’s not like I was doing any strenuous activities last night. Mainly because I had to cut off any relationship I had with Mitzi Parkinson. Salazar, I hadn’t had sex in two months! I was starting to feel like my thirteen year old self again, horny and antsy.   
I shook my body out to try and get rid of the feeling and headed over to the kitchenette and asked the fridge for a full works breakfast. It didn’t fail to deliver either. I pulled out two plates of a full English breakfast consisting of bacon, sausages, eggs (scrambled and fried), hash browns, baked beans, tomatoes and mushrooms, toast was included on a separate plate along with the butter and a whole pitcher of orange juice was included. The Hogwarts House Elves know how to deliver a breakfast. It looks delicious.   
I walk over to the couch and wave a plate under Weasley’s nose figuring the smell of bacon will wake her up. Her nose starts twitching and she opens one eye and eyes the bacon suspiciously.  
“The House Elves sent it up from the kitchens; I’ve just got it nothing’s wrong with it I promise.” I say to her gruffly, how could she think I’d poison her? Hex her sure, jinx even more plausible but poison, I’m not a complete arsehole… just a little one.  
“Thanks Scorpius, I appreciate it.” She says reaching for the plate. I raise my eyebrows in shock; did she just call me Scorpius, not Malfoy? Slytherin’s mighty fine ass the worlds frozen over!  
“You’re welcome Rose, bon appetite.” She makes no notice of my use of her first name and digs straight into her bacon and sausages.   
We are silent whilst we eat our breakfast and drink our juice. She finishes before me of course since she is a Weasley she inherited her families ability to inhale food without choking.   
“Should we go talk to Headmistress Leyson about our idea or should we leave it for a while?” Rose asks whilst taking her plate to the sink and placing it in there to which is disappears as soon as it touches the bottom of the sink. She frowns at it.  
“Yeah sure, may as well get it over with before your Quidditch practice this afternoon.” I mumbled to her.  
She nodded and came back over towards me and grabbed the paperwork off the coffee table and headed upstairs without a word to get dressed. Not five minutes later I heard the shower running. She didn’t take long meaning she probably didn’t wash her hair which made sense since she’d get sweaty later anyway during Quidditch practice.   
I placed my plate in the sink and it vanished quickly. I wonder why we have a sink if we never need to wash up.   
Rose came downstairs not long after wearing a pair of black skinny fit jeans and a short sleeved grey t-shirt with black boots. “I’m ready Malfoy, let’s go see Leyson.”   
We leave the confines of our common room and head towards the headmistresses office. Having been in there a couple of times because my sister likes getting me in trouble – bloody Phoenix – with her pranks made with the other Weasley’s I knew where to go. Although if you didn’t after seven years here you’d be considered an idiot so maybe only Hufflepuff’s didn’t know where it was and some seriously inbred Slytherin’s.   
We reached there after a five minute walk; it wasn’t far from the Head Dorms surprisingly. Standing in front of the Gargoyle I realised I didn’t know the password.  
“Do you know the password Weasley?” I sighed.  
“Yes, Pixie Puffs” She says and the Gargoyle moves we step on the steps that appear and wait for it to stop twirling up then once it stops we climb the last few steps and knock on the door.  
“Come in!” Shouts a voice from within the office, we both look at each other and open the door. Nothing much had changed according to my father when he’s been called to the office to stop me and Nixie from killing each other – We love each other really except from when we are on opposite ends of a prank.   
The portraits were still littered over the wall, now including the one of Professor McGonagall which was next door but one to Professor Dumbledore and Professor Snape was in between them. They were all currently looking at us with raised eyebrows.   
“Told you it would happen Minerva” Dumbledore said to McGonagall.  
“Nothing’s happened yet Albus; they’re just Head students currently.” She sighed.  
“Well, we all know what happened to James and Lily, it’s been happening ever since.” McGonagall added.   
“Can we not talk about Potter and Lily please? Get on with the meeting Leena.” Snape butted in. Bless him still caught up about Lily Potter, the witch that got away…  
“Yes Severus, what brings you two here?” Professor Leyson says turning to us.   
“Well it’s to do with the marriage law.” Rose starts  
“Yes…?”   
“Well Rose was thinking that we could set up a speed dating type of affair so that people can get to know each other before we are made to marry strangers?”   
“And how would this work exactly?” She questioned.  
“Well we would each get paired with somebody different over the course of a few nights a week leading up until the choosing ceremony, and we have set out some questions, some from the original questionnaire we had to fill out and some others so that we can determine who would possibly be the best match for ourselves and hopefully we can get to know each other before we have to marry them, and if that doesn’t work at least we can make new friends…” Rose states to Professor Leyson and then trails off towards the end.   
“I must say Leena, that that does sound like a very good idea, I would even suggest the Ministry do it for the rest of the years also.” Dumbledore said with both McGonagall and Snape nodding in agreement.   
“Yes, I agree, it’s a very good idea. You can do it every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday after dinner, for a couple of hours that way it wouldn’t impact too much on Quidditch or any other after school activities.” She says nodding looking at her School Rota on the wall, it showed what years were in what class and when certain things were being held, when somebody swapped Quidditch practice times it automatically changed.   
“Thank you… We will get everything sorted to start next week.” Rose says with a smile on her face.  
Leyson nods and I guess that’s our cue to leave. We both walk out the office and look at one another.  
“Well that was easier than I thought it’d be…” I said to her and she nodded.  
We walked out of the corridor and I started heading off towards the Dungeons, I needed to talk to the Slytherin’s about this, they’re going to be the less likely to corroporate.   
“Wish me luck Rose, I’m going to talk this over with the Slytherin’s.”   
“Luck!” She said with a laugh walking off.  
This was going to be a long-arsed afternoon.


	7. Malfoy! You cheating Ferrett!

Chapter 7  
Rose POV

After I walked off from Malfoy I went straight to Gryffindor Common Room hoping to find Belle and Frankie, if I manage to corner Scamander and Wood too that might save me some talking, and where Scamander and Wood are, Shacklebolt isn’t far behind. Joined at the bloody hip those three are.  
Reaching the Common Room the Fat Lady is currently inspecting her nails; because of course they’re going to get dirty in a painting! Merlin help me.   
“Password?” She says not looking up from her nails. Rude.   
“Albus Dumbledore” I say clearly to her she nods and the portrait flips open, I clamber inside of the hole and walk straight into the Common Room, god how I’ve missed this place. Since school started I’ve barely stepped foot in here. As soon as I do however, I am accosted by family members.   
“Rose!”  
“Rosie!”  
I turn around at ‘Rosie’ and see my younger Cousins Adelina and Tobias, my uncle Charlie’s kids. I wasn’t expecting to see them in here since they’re Ravenclaw’s but I guess they came to see Hugo and Lily who they were sitting with. I walked over to my family sitting on a couple of armchairs and a couch and sat on the arm of Lily’s chair. They were obviously in the middle of a game of Exploding Snap since Hugo currently had burnt eyebrows, and Adelina currently had a burn to her wrist.   
“Ouch that looks like it hurts, come here…” I said reaching out towards Addie’s wrist, she gave me her wrist and I fished out my wand from my robe pocket, “Parva Injurias Curare” I said pointing at her burn, within seconds it had disappeared.   
“Thanks Rosie!” Adelina squealed and hugged me tightly, she was very sweet and full of energy, whenever I’ve seen her she’s always been darting off somewhere with her many friends following after her. She’s very well liked, her brother Tobias, however is very reserved and quiet, the only time he comes out of himself is around family. So, he doesn’t have as many friends as Addie.   
“You’re welcome sweetie, now, what are you guys doing cooped up on a lovely day like today?” I asked them genuinely wondering since if I wasn’t busy I would be outside enjoying this glorious weather, which is so very rare in Scotland.   
“Well, we were going to go flying, but the Hufflepuff’s are practicing at the moment so we are waiting for them to finish so we can go fly. Addie and I want to make the Ravenclaw team next year; their Beaters are seventh years, so we want their spots, so we have to be the best!” Toby said, yes he might be quiet and reserved but when it comes to Quidditch that boy is definitely a Weasley through and through, and they are referring to Paddy Finnigan and Jasmine Holmes’ spots.   
“Well, let’s hope so huh.” I said giving him an encouraging smile. Addie and Toby are pretty good flyers for their age actually, I guess it might be because they’ve grown up around Dragon’s and have been allowed to fly some of them, so they’ve always been in the air at some point in their lives, “Anyways guys, I’ve got to go and find my friends, you haven’t seen them anywhere have you?” I asked.  
“I saw Scamander and Wood upstairs in their dorm earlier, and Belle and Frankie went up there not long ago. So, they’ll all be in the Boys Dorm.” Hugo told me. I nodded and said goodbye heading up the boy’s staircase. Why nobody has put a jinx on the boys’ staircase is beyond me. It didn’t take me long to find the room since I’ve been going there for years, I walked in there and nothing out of the ordinary was going on, Frankie was lounging on Lysander’s bed reading a magazine, looked like Witch Weekly but I couldn’t be sure, Belle was sitting on Xavier’s bed since it was empty and Jonathan was currently penning a letter over at the desk in the corner, which reminded me I needed to write to my mum, and to Mr and Mrs Malfoy to ask how she was doing since my mum wouldn’t tell me the truth and they would.   
“Who’re you writing to Jonny?” I asked wandering over to him and sitting on the alcove by the desk, I preferred sitting here since you had a lovely view of the Quidditch pitch. I could currently see Ravenclaw practicing. Gryffindor were due for practice later on today.   
“Oh, just writing to Joe, you know how he is, always checking up on the team, wasn’t like he didn’t graduate two years ago or nothing he was also banging on about how I’ve barely written to mum this year and she’s had to ask Margot how I am in her letters.” Jonny said with a laugh.   
Margot is Jonny’s younger sister who prefers to go by Maggie, their mum Katie Bell-Wood is somebody you do not want to mess with and I’m very surprised she has not sent a howler to her son for ignoring her this year. Apparently though Maggie has been giving her enough information to sate her need for gossip which begs the question of how she’s getting it since they very rarely speak to one another…   
“You Woods, always obsessed with Quidditch, what would your family do if Quidditch hadn’t been invented!” I mocked.   
“Very funny Weasley, it’s not like your family isn’t obsessed either!” Jonny countered.  
“Fair enough Wood. How is he dealing with this whole arranged marriage thing?”  
“Not well, you know he was with a Muggle girl before all this right, he’s now had to leave her, he might still be allowed to marry her because her being a Muggle and us being Half-Blood’s might mean that there is a higher chance for magical offspring, but the Ministry might not want to risk it, so they’ve gone ‘on a break’ as the Muggle’s call it.” Jonny didn’t seem too happy about this development between his brother and his now ex-girlfriend.   
“This does seem to be ruining decent relationships, like I hate to say it but Finnigan and Carmen have ‘split up’ because of all this, although I know for a fact they still meet up on occasion they just aren’t together out in the open. Greengrass-Page and Nott were good together too, but since they’re both Pureblood’s they won’t be allowed together which is a damn shame, they complimented each other.” I argued; this whole situation was winding me the hell up. Fine all be it well and good, to try and increase the Magical population, but leave happy couples alone and let them get on with things.   
“Yeah, he’s getting over it now, he was pretty cut up about it but he’s seeing the brighter side that now he doesn’t have to hide who is around whoever he gets paired with you know? Since they’re already Magical.”  
“Yeah I guess… Anyway, I actually came up here for a reason… Everybody gather round!” I yell towards the end at the room, everybody stops what they’re doing and looks towards me, not gathering but at least showing me attention.   
“Good, right now, Malfoy and I went to Leyson earlier today and she agreed to allow us to host a little Speed Dating thing so that we can get to know people we wouldn’t normally interact with. I think we are going to start it the weekend after the Quidditch Match since it means there’s loads of weekends free just before Christmas then after also before the next games start back up. What do you guys think about it all?”   
“Sounds good to me Rose, you know, anything to make this whole thing less painful, plus it might be nice to see how many chicks I can pull…” Lysander said with a smirk, such a tosser this one.   
“Sure, but if I get paired with a dickhead don’t expect me not to curse the twat to Timbuktu.” Belle said smiling, probably already imagining a potential target.  
“Wouldn’t expect anything less from you Belle… What about you Frankie, Jonny?”   
“Well we haven’t really got a choice in the matter have we, if it stops me from having to marry somebody I don’t even know or have barely said a word to I’m all for it to stop it being so awkward.” Frankie stated maturely. Jonny just nodded which I took for agreement, he obviously thought along the same lines as Frankie or he just didn’t care. He just wanted to be happy at the end of the day, just like all of us I guess.   
Fucking Ministry for Magic and its stupid fucking ideas!   
That seemed easier than I thought though; maybe Malfoy’s friends were giving him a hard time about it? Probably, they are Slytherin’s after all. Even Albus will probably tell him to bore off and that he can get laid without some help from a stupid dating exercise.   
“Thanks guys, this means a lot that you’re willing to go along with this. I know it’s hard but we are all in this together so we need to help one another and make it easier on everybody.”   
“Yeah we know Rose; we are all in this shitty situation together.” Belle says to me with a huff.   
“Cool, anyway, Frankie, Jonny shouldn’t we be heading down to the Pitch now for practice before the game?”   
“Yep, the Ravenclaw’s should be finishing up anytime now… See you down there?” Jonny said rummaging through his school trunk and pulling pieces of Quidditch gear out of it, obviously he was getting changed up here.  
“Sure thing, see you down there.” I said heading out of the room to, my gear was down at the pitch so I’d get changed down there along with Frankie.   
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“Okay team, so we are going to practice Chaser drills today since our game against Slytherin needs to be good with our Chasers, they always try to take the Chasers out with their Beaters, our plan of action today is to make sure we cover our Chasers from all sides. I’ve got the charmed Bludgers that go after certain team members, since Weasley, Potter and Longbottom are the best Chaser’s Gryffindor has had in years we will be protecting them from getting knocked out by rouge Bludgers and cheating Slytherin’s. On protection patrol are obviously Shacklebolt and Weasley. Now I know of everything that’s gone on between you Shacklebolt and Weaslette but when you’re on this pitch there are no ex’s, girlfriends or boyfriends there is just team mates and the opposition which we have to beat okay?” Jonny said, he always goes and has some pep talk before practice, why he had to bring up me and Xav is beyond me, it would have made more sense to tell Hugo to stop trying to knock his wonderful sister out because she refused to give him some of my pocket money from mum and dad to buy WWW products from Al after he sneaks out to Hogsmeade tonight, guy’s still holding my Sugar Quills and Chocolate Frogs hostage until I give him some.   
“Yes we know, plus me and Rose actually are okay you know?” Xavier says to Jonny, I raise my eyebrows at him; we have barely spoken since we broke up. Unless we are drunk, then we talk a fair amount during parties and whatnot, since we share the same friends it’s inevitable unfortunately, but yeah I wouldn’t go as far to say as we are friends.   
“Sure, just don’t let her, Longbottom, or Potter get knocked out okay.” He said looking around at the group.  
“Fern, find that Snitch okay! As soon as! Okay, off we go” He says looking at Belle’s little sister, she is actually a great Seeker; she is slight and very quick on a broom. She just gets distracted sometimes… Mainly by my brother who is two years older than her, and barely knows who she is. Unrequited Loves a bitch isn’t it, but I guess Love always wins in the end right…? Doesn’t help Hugo is exactly how dad was, completely oblivious to what was in front of him the whole time.   
We mount our brooms and are out on the pitch in no time, the balls are released from their container and off we are flying. Frankie, Lily and I are all passing the Quaffle backwards and forwards between us, always changing up the sequence of who we are passing too, nobody but us know, we score a few goals within the first five minutes and then that’s when the Bludgers decide to come after us. Mimicking the behaviour of the opposite team… Magic is so clever isn’t it?   
Just not when the Bludger decides it wants to knock your skull in two. I dodge the Bludger and go flying off course away from my fellow Chasers and avoid the Bludger the best I can, it still following me though and I fly off in the opposite direction to where it was heading. My plan worked for all of about two seconds before it started chasing me around the pitch… It’s Uncle Harry all over again!  
“Who cursed the blasted Bludger! Help me you idiots!” I shout over towards my lovely brother who is meant to be helping me from not getting my skull smashed into a million tiny pieces with brain matter splattered all over the pitch, yes, I make for wonderful imagery.   
“Well it’s only going after you because you still have the bloody Quaffle!” Hugo shouted back, I looked down and cradled in my lap is in fact the Quaffle. Sometimes I wonder what goes through my head, of course it’s chasing me it’s simulating the Slytherin Beater’s who will quite happily knock me from my broom if I have the Quaffle in my grasp.   
“Sorry Hugh!” I shouted back since I did just have a go at him and passed it back to Lily who had flown closer to me now I realised I wasn’t being attacked with a dodgy Bludger.   
We scored a few more goals before something over in the Slytherin stands caught my eye, a bit of light reflected off something, curiosity getting the best of me made me go over to check it out. Getting yelled at by my fellow team mates nearly made me turn back though.  
“Shut up, I think somebody's spying!” I yell back, this stops them and Frankie follows behind me slowly not wanted to get to close to the alleged spy.   
Flying over towards the stands I immediately recognise the person as Malfoy, bloody spy.   
“Malfoy! Get out of here! You cheating ferret!” I yell.  
“Oi Weasley! Fancy that Bludger trying to knock you off your broom!” He shouted back with a smirk. Of course, it was him trying to knock me off my broom, the Slytherin prat.   
“Leave the pitch Malfoy before I make you leave!” I practically growl. It wasn’t like I didn’t have to deal with him every waking moment of the day, our common room, classes, rounds, he had to come and interrupt the one time I have without him! Fuck me! I’m going to be sent to Azkaban before I leave school for murdering another student… Unless I don’t get caught… Albus will help me hide his body. Wait, no he won’t Malfoy’s his friend. Who would help…? Belle definitely would, so would Lily…   
Stop thinking about this!   
I’m not going to Murder Malfoy; he’s annoying but not Murder-worthy.   
“Nope I think I’ll stay…” He’s goading me, I know it, Frankie flies closer to me and yanks me back slightly when I start drifting forward on my broom which I barely noticed doing I might add.   
“Your funeral then.” I snarl.   
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We finished practice early because Scorpius refused to leave which made the rest of the team uneasy since he was on the opposing team. So, we went back into the changing rooms and got changed, we all agreed to come out here tomorrow morning before breakfast (when the pitch is never booked) to finish our practice since nobody would be awake at that time anyway. Especially on a weekend. Everybody sleeps in on weekends.   
Walking back to the Castle I was talking with Lily, we were talking about a boy who she has a crush on and how she would get him to notice her.   
“So how is getting Cassius Zabini to notice you? Any luck on the rounds yet?” I ask, since I had put her with him on rounds she comes back seeming either very annoyed or really happy.  
“Well, it’s okay sometimes but I swear the boy has some issues with noticing when people like him! He’s completely oblivious!” She huffs at me pushing a stray piece of hair behind her ear and out of the way of her blue eyes.   
She was the only one of the Potter children to have inherited the Weasley blue eyes. James had brown eyes, and Albus had his father’s Green.   
“Lily, that’s just boys in general. Do you know how many times I had to practically shout in Xav’s face that I fancied him? Too many to count, that’s how many! And he still didn’t show any notice until I kissed him in the middle of the Gryffindor party during 5th year when we won the Quidditch Cup. Trust me, the only way to get boys to notice is to practically spell it out because boys wouldn’t notice you if you were straight up in front of the naked and doing the cancan with a florescent sign saying, ‘Hey Cassius, let’s get it on!’ talking about your feelings. Just tonight, on your rounds why don’t you just lay one on him.” I said, she raised her eyebrows and shook her head, she was about to answer me when somebody rudely cut into our conversation.  
“Seriously Potter, you think you can ask Cassius on a date and get away with it? You better think again.” Venus Zabini practically growls as she comes down the marble staircase to the entrance hall.   
“I have no idea what you’re talking about Zabini…” Lily said, which was a blatant lie since we were just talking about him.   
“Well then, let me spell it out for you… Leave. Cassius. Alone. He. Is. My. Brother. And. I WILL make your life a living hell. Capeesh?” She says scathingly getting into Lily’s face,   
“And what are you going to do about it if I do start dating your brother Zabini huh?” Lily snarls back squaring up to Venus.  
“I will have to get rid of you, and it will be painful…” Venus snarls back eyes narrowed into slits, if she could look any more like a snake I think she would. Lily looks slightly taken aback and is about to answer when I feel I should get involved being Head Girl and all.  
“Whatever Zabini, I can still date Cassius if I want to that’s his choice to make. You have no control over him, he has his own mind.”   
“And where does it state that you have a say over whom Cassius can date Venus? I think you should back off and leave my cousin alone. This isn’t between you and her it’s between her and Cassius. It’s his choice who he wants to date and whether he wants to date Lily or not is not your choice.” I butt in.  
“What are you going to do about it Weasley. Just because you’re Head Girl doesn’t mean you can watch Little Potter here wherever the fuck she goes.” She sneers.  
“Watch me Zabini, 20 points from Slytherin 10 for answering back to the Head Girl and the other 10 for bullying behaviour.” I shout. The Slytherin House Point Hourglass glowed and took away 20 of the Green Emeralds that tally up house points. The Gryffindor Hourglass uses Rubies, Ravenclaw Blue Sapphires and Hufflepuff Yellow Diamonds.   
“Now, Now Rosie Posie, No need for that.” Says an irritating voice with an even more irritating nickname that’s just entered the Entrance Hall from outside, obviously he made his way back from the Quidditch Pitch.  
“Go away Malfoy!” I huff at him. He just smirks his stupid Malfoy smirk at me.   
“No, since I’m Head Boy and you’ve just taken 20points away from my house, I deserve to know why?” He says walking up to me and crossing his arms.  
“Venus here was being nasty to Lily over Cassius, which is none of Venus’ business anyway. I took 20points away for bullying another student and for answering me back.”   
“Venus is this true?” He says eyebrows raised and looking stern.  
“Scorpy, Cass can’t go out with her!” She moans pointing a perfectly manicured finger at Lily, who looks down at her nail bitten hands sadly.   
“V, Cass can date whoever the fuck he wants. Nobody has a say in the matter. Quite frankly, I think your father would be delighted for Cass to be dating a Potter-Weasley since it would mean not having the family ostracised, anymore wouldn’t it? Dating the daughter of the most famous Wizard ever? It would mean no more searches by the Auror department for Dark Artefacts, no more slandering of the Zabini name; he can finally get back to his family’s Jewellery business. I think your father would be happy for Cassius finding somebody to love him for who he is given his parents past decisions, I know my dad would be happy if I was allowed to find love by myself, but some of us aren’t that lucky are we? Just leave him alone and let him get on with his life V, you can’t control him forever, he’s older than you anyway for Merlin’s sake.” Scorpius went off in a triad at Venus; I’m guessing he was done with her bitchy ways… He probably has to hear Darius and Cassius complain about her all the time.   
Venus just looked back at Lily and with a scowl walked away and down the staircase to the Slytherin common room. Lily looked up at me and smiled slightly and ran up the marble staircase towards the Gryffindor common room but stopped half way up.  
“Thanks Malfoy…” She said before continuing up the stairs at full speed.  
Scorpius just nodded and went to walk off the way Venus went.  
“Wait… Thanks for that Scorpius.” I shouted after him before he disappeared into the depths of the castle. He stopped short of the staircase heading down to the Dungeons and turned around to look at me, he looked at me for a minute or so before answering, I guess to make sure that I was sincere in what I said.   
“No problem, she is my best mates baby sister; I have to watch out for her the same as Al would look out for Nixie and Lyra. You just have to know how to handle Venus. She wants what’s best for her family. She worries for them. She believes her family are better than everybody thinks, because of their money and their infamy, what she doesn’t realise is infamy and fame are two different things. Her father wants the fame and wealth again. If any of his children can help with that then he will take what he can get.”   
“Well… Just as long as it’s for love and not reputation…”   
“Of course, it would be for the reputation, love would come later. It did for my parents, and grandparents. It will for us too.” Scorpius says sadly.  
“For us?” I practically squeak, was he suggesting that we would be getting married?!  
“Yes, we are getting married to strangers in less than four months.”  
“Oh yes… Strangers…” I mutter, not quite sure whether that feeling in my belly is one of relief or disappointment. “What are we going to do?” I mutter under my breath.  
“There’s nothing we can do Rose, except just hope we are put with somebody we can grow to love.” Scorpius says walking over to me and placing a hand on my shoulder in a comforting manner.  
“Yes, but what if we don’t?! What if we have to be in a loveless marriage forever! We have to have children with this person! These children are going to grow up in a hate filled marriage! Oh, My Godric! We could inadvertently be creating the next Voldemort!” I wailed with tears running down my face. I’m beginning to fill overwhelmed the wedding is drawing ever closer and I have no idea how I am going to handle this!  
“Rose calm down!” He says looking into my eyes, “Take deep breaths okay, follow my breathing. It’s all going to be okay…” He said placing my hand on his chest so I could follow my breathing with his chest movement, wiping some of my tears away.   
I was managing to calm down but I was still feeling scared about the whole situation. Scorpius though was making me feel slightly better. I placed my face on his chest to follow his breathing easier, leaving wet tear marks on his shirt. Scorpius was started stroking my hair to calm me down; I guess it’s something he does with his sisters whenever they’re upset.   
After a while of just standing in the Entrance Hall which strangely had stayed empty through this whole exchange, I managed to calm down enough to step back from him.   
“T-thank you…” I stuttered looking up at him and into his beautiful molten silver eyes.   
Scorpius looked back at me into my plain blue eyes. My eyes flickered down to his lips, the bottom one only so slightly fuller than his top…  
I wonder what he would taste like… All I have to do is lean in just a tiny little bit…   
Shit did I just think about kissing Malfoy! Scorpius Malfoy!  
I pull away from him sharply and say my thanks and run up the marble stair case leaving Scorpius behind me just as confused as myself. Running up the stairs I find myself on the Second-floor landing and hide in an alcove obscured from view by a tapestry that only a few people namely my family members know where it is.  
I wanted to kiss Scorpius Malfoy… And I think I would have enjoyed it…   
What happened to not liking him aye Rosie!   
Damn this isn’t going to end well…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please Leave a Comment or Kudos! Thank you xx


	8. A Date? With Malfoy? Oh, Great...

Chapter 8  
Scorpius POV

I stay standing in the middle of the Entrance Hall for another minute or so. I feel very confused. Rose was going off on one again about this Marriage Law, which is totally understandable… I was hugging her and stroking her hair, which is surprisingly soft by the way, you would have thought that curly mass of hair wasn’t that soft, but it is and smells of Roses. Cliché I know, but it’s true.  
Actually, she just smells good in general.  
So, I’m hugging her enjoying her smell and then she looks up at me with her sparkling ocean blue eyes that I swear show every emotion that girl experiences in them, and the way they were looking at me was like she wanted to kiss me. She stayed looking like that for what seemed like hours but could have literally been two seconds and she started leaning closer and I was about to lean in further but she pulled away and ran… she fucking ran away!  
Nobody’s ever run away from me before, and now I’m standing here in the middle of the Entrance Hall in shock. I don’t understand her. I shake my head and rub my hands down my face and walk down to the Slytherin common room. Hopefully Albus will be there and can help a bloke out, although I doubt he wants to hear about how I nearly snogged his cousin.  
I reached the entrance to the Slytherin common room and said the password which was ‘Severus Snape’ I guess this year’s theme is people who were in your house who died in the Wizarding War. I strut into the Common Room like I own the place, which since I’m a Malfoy I probably do to them. Slytherin loyalty and all that shit.  
Albus was sitting on a green leather couch in front of the fire with Darius. Okay, at least I won’t have to repeat this twice.  
“Al, I need to talk to you.” I say as I sit next to him.  
“Sounds serious. What’s this about? Is it why Venus came in here crying not long ago?” Albus asked questioningly.  
“Venus came in here crying? Well she’s being ridiculous. She started on Lily first Al, so I just told her to shut up and leave Lily alone.” I huff.  
“Oh, she’s never liked your sister Al sorry mate. Is this over Cass again? Girl needs to get over herself. You know she sent a huge letter like 10pages worth when she found out about the Marriage Law and how this could ruin our family because of bringing in impure people into the family line. Mother told her to shut up and stop being ridiculous. We don’t live in those times anymore. She needs to stop thinking like that, it’s disgusting. Blood Purity is nothing anymore…” Darius seethed, yup, he was getting annoyed with V too.  
“Well anyway, V and Lily aren’t what I want to talk to you about, it’s about what happened afterwards.” I breath out, this is going to be hard.  
“So… What happened after then?” Al asked.  
“So Lily was with Rose, after I stopped the argument, Lily thanked me and went upstairs, I started heading down here and Rose thanked me which made me pause because she never thanks me for anything…” I say trailing off.  
“Is that it?” Al says obviously getting annoyed with the story already.  
“No. It’s not.” I take a deep breath and continue, “We start talking about how Your father” I say looking at Darius who nods and understands how he’s involved in this, “would be quite happy with Cass dating Lily because of the changes it would make to the families lifestyle again. She said something about as long as it’s for love and not reputation and I said it would be but love would come later like it did for my parents and grandparents and it would for us too. She got all scared about having to marry strangers went into full blown panic mode and burst into tears… So I hugged her to calm her down… I stroked her hair too, like I do to Nixie and Lyra when they’re upset…” I said this all quietly and didn’t look at Albus or Darius, I took a deep breath and continued, “Once she’d calmed down she thanked me and we just stood there looking at each other, it was one of the most *word* moments that’s ever happened between us and I swear she was going to kiss me Al, but before I could close the distance she pulled away and ran off…” I breathed a heavy sigh and then looked up at the both of them; they were both looking at each other silently communicating apparently… I thought only girls do that… Apparently not?  
“You think that Weasley almost kissed you?” Darius affirms to me.  
“Yes, I do, she was leaning into me and her eyes were closing like peoples do when they’re about to kiss somebody.” I echo my previous statement. Stupid idiot’s don’t listen do they? I’ve already said that she was going to kiss me but then fucked off running for the hills… and I want to know why for Merlin’s sake.  
“Okay so say she did nearly kissed you, do you like her?” Al implored.  
“Well, I don’t actually know…” I say with a frown, I wouldn’t have minded kissing her but I don’t mind kissing a lot of people.  
“Well you know how to find out don’t you?” Darius said with a devilish smirk.  
“No, what?”  
“You change the couples that were due to go on the dates this week and change it so you and Rose go on the date instead.” He suggested. It was a good suggestion actually, since we had put a spell on the parchment means I can counteract it so that only mine and Rose’s partners were changed.  
“You know that’s not a bad idea, and since we haven’t seen the chosen partners yet, maybe I can get it to change that…” I say with a cunning smirk.  
“Yeah, but Scorp if you do, do that then leave her alone for a few days okay, she probably doesn’t know what just happened so just leave her alone for a while. If she wants to talk to you she will yeah?” Albus suggests.  
“Okay Al, I’ll leave her alone.” I mumbled not happy with the turn of events, I did still however have to change our names over, so I said goodbye and headed towards the Deputy Head Professor Boot’s office.  
“Stay here the night Malfoy so you don’t bump into one another.” I nodded and we headed up to bed. 

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I wake up and have a shower; I am still reeling over the result of the Quidditch game yesterday. Slytherin won by 10 points which Rose was not impressed with, so I have been avoiding Rose for the past 24hrs, but not for much longer because, today’s the day, the day when I get to go on my date with Rose. Weirdly enough I actually feel nervous. I never feel nervous before dates.  
But this was Rose Weasley we are talking about. She makes everyone nervous, even the Professors sometimes.  
Anyway, pushing away my nervous feeling I had and went down to breakfast. I hadn’t been in my Head Dorm for the past four days, so I haven’t seen Rose since our near kiss incident, and now we are going to be paired together on a date. The parchment is enchanted and has been in the protection of Professor Boot in his office under lock and key and will read out the pairings after breakfast this morning.  
How did I manage to change an enchanted piece of parchment, that was in a Professors office under lock and key you ask?  
Well with great difficulty. But since it was Darius’ idea, he and Albus helped me out. Us Slytherin’s stick together you see.  
We had to create a diversion. We used some of Albus’ uncles WWW products and created a situation which only Professor Boot could diffuse. It was very clever actually. We used a Decoy Detonator and then used some of Uncle George’s fireworks as a distraction that needs to be transfigured to be stopped. Whilst he was distracted, Darius and I snuck into his office and countered the charm used on the parchment to change mine and Rose’s partners. Which I was quite pleased with actually since I was paired with some Hufflepuff bint. I would rather die.  
The journey down to breakfast was uneventful except for of course Albus moaning about who he is going to be paired with and whether they will be boring or not. He just wants some fit bird so he can get laid at the end of this. He is very sexually frustrated. Actually, we all are. You know, since we aren’t allowed to date anymore loads of us have resorted in the occasional one-night stand between 7th years. Which was another reason to do this date thing, at least then it might actually get people *Darius* to see people as actual human beings.  
Fucking man whore.  
Honestly the guys worse than me, from the middle of 4th year onwards that guy was sleeping with people. He even managed to get a few of the old 7th years to sleep with him whilst he was still a 4th year. I have no idea how he did it but that guy has serious skills. His older brother Elexus though is nothing like Darius, he actually has relationships. He’s in one now but won’t tell anybody who it is. It’s all too secretive. Darius and Cassius think he’s going to come out as Gay. I just think he doesn’t fancy introducing this girl to his dysfunctional family.  
I sit down at the Slytherin table next to Al and Darius, Gerard and Sam come in together, even though they’re not allowed to be together they spend exactly the same amount of time together as they did in the first place I don’t think the Ministry would be pleased to hear this. Although other couples have ‘Split up’, they are going back to each other for casual sex… So maybe that’s what my cousin is doing, lucky bastard... Samantha Nott is actually a good-looking girl.  
“So, guys, today’s the day. Who do you think you’ll get paired with?” Gerard questions us depressively.  
“Oh, I don’t know but I can’t wait to find out…” I practically squeal with giddy excitement since I know who I’m going with, but of course us Malfoy’s do not ‘squeal with giddy excitement’ so instead I just said it nonchalantly, nobody will notice. Maybe I can actually get her to kiss me this time…  
“Your very chipper this morning Malfoy, what happened to you in that past 12hrs to make you so happy about these stupid compulsory dates?” Samantha queried. She did see me being incredibly grumpy last night because I couldn’t decide on what to wear for this date of ours. In the end, I decided on a black button down shirt and jacket because you know it’s near Christmas now and its bloody cold outside with dark denim jeans and some high top black shoes that Muggle’s call Converse.  
I thought I looked pretty good actually.  
Al got Nixie, Lily and Lyra to come help me, because I was stressing out so much. I know what you’re going to say, why was Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy stressing out over a date, with a Weasley no less? Well, I’ll tell you. It’s because for all I know, me and Rose could get paired together and I want us to actually have a good time.  
I load bacon, eggs, sausages and hash browns onto my plate with some toast and beans on the side. People think I’m weird because I don’t like my beans to touch my other foods, unless it’s my toast. I eat that pretty quickly and down some orange juice.  
I continue talking to my friends for another 10minutes then the Headmistress stands up and dismisses the other years except for the 7th years.  
“Okay, I now will read out who you will be going on your date with;  
Carmen Adler with Lawrence Tyler,  
Ehren Bates with Lorcan Scamander;  
Destiny Carrow-Flint with Douglas Holton,  
Callie Dolling with Gerard Greengrass-Page,  
Jasmine Holmes with Albus Potter,  
Francesca Longbottom with Kenny Stewart,  
Caitlyn Marsh with Elliot Parkman,  
Samantha Nott with Jaime Sykes  
Lola Owens with Shawn Johnson  
Savannah Peters with Darius Zabini,  
Verity Robertson with Lysander Scamander,  
Dawn Simpson with Alistair Fairhead,  
Ginger Sharp with Robert Stone,  
Holly Skeeter with Paddy Finnigan  
Esmeralda Slughorn with Harvey Emms,  
Odette Swan with Xavier Shacklebolt,  
Bleu-Belle Thistle with Ezra Pucey,  
Diamond Vaisey with Jonathan Wood  
Erica Watson with Tyler Reeves,  
And Finally  
Rosaline Weasley with Scorpius Malfoy,  
Enjoy your dates everybody please remember you still have your 10pm curfew, I would also like everybody to come for a meeting after your dates at 10.30pm prompt. Have fun!” Professor Leyson muses happily.  
Everybody gets up and heads outside into the entrance hall to great their date. Rose saunters over to me looking miffed.  
“Come on Malfoy, let’s get this over with…” Rose mutters and heads out the door, I follow her dutifully.  
“So, what do you want to do?” I question looking round at everybody else leaving. Albus and Jasmine look quite happy already, but Rose’s friend Belle looks pissed off massively with Ezra, jeez if he doesn’t get hexed by the end of today I will run around the courtyard naked.  
“Butterbeer and maybe a walk?” Rose suggested whilst looking at the floor. I reach out to her and link her arm in mine.  
“What’re you doing Malfoy?” Rose stutters.  
“We are on a date, right? So, I’m being a gentleman and keeping you warm on this cold winter day.” I say pulling her closer to me. She resists for a moment but then sinks into me to try and shield herself from the cold wind billowing around.  
“Alright Malfoy, we will see how this goes…” Rose shivers and continues walking towards Hogsmeade, “So where are we going to have these Butterbeer’s?”  
“Well, I don’t know about you but I’m not going anywhere near Puddifoots because quite frankly I can’t stand the colour pink, and I don’t quite fancy throwing up over my beautiful date.” I cringe at the thought of having to step foot in that ghastly tea shop.  
“Beautiful…?” Rose squeaked, she looked up at me shocked and didn’t quite know what to do with herself.  
“Yes Rose, you must know how beautiful you are? If you were any more beautiful I would have thought you were part Veela.” I compliment her, because she did look beautiful she always did, but she especially looked beautiful today, her red hair was beautifully windswept and her nose and cheeks were a cute reddy-pink colour from the cold blistering wind hitting her face, her lips were coloured red from the lipstick she was wearing and her eyeliner made her blue eyes stand out so much. Her outfit though (what I’d seen of it so far) she was wearing dark skinny jeans with black boots that went up past her ankles and a grey coat with a grey beanie hat over her long hair and her Gryffindor scarf – of course.  
“Oh haha! Stop with your creeping. We are on a date because it’s compulsory, not because we want to be here. Stop trying to charm me Malfoy, your insufferable.” Rose laughs, we continue walking and are nearly at Hogsmeade.  
“Three Broomsticks?” I suggest she nods and we head over towards the door. Other couples either follow or head towards Puddifoots, one of those couples seems to be Belle and Ezra, oh joy. I better start organising a funeral. Francesca and that Stewart kid are heading into Honeydukes followed by a few others including Darius and Savannah Peters.  
I pull Rose over towards where the fire is and sit just off to the side of it so we don’t get to hot but so that we do actually warm up.  
“They couldn’t have picked a better weekend to start this could they?” Rose laughs sarcastically, taking off her jacket, she was wearing a woollen jumper underneath that looked oversized and was hanging off one shoulder showing off her porcelain skin that was dotted with adorable freckles...  
Did I just say ‘adorable freckles’… God I’m turning into a girl!  
“You do know this was our idea, right?” I correct her, she nods and smiles slyly at me.  
“So, what did you do to get me on this date Malfoy?” Rose questions.  
“Nothing, just pure luck I guess, after all why wouldn’t they put the Head Boy and Girl together?” I answer back smoothly, hopefully she buys it.  
“Hmm… alright, I guess that does make sense.” She concedes. She buys it.  
Madam Rosmerta who still works here from when my dad was at school comes bustling over and takes our orders. Rose orders a Toad in the Hole and a Butterbeer and I order a Shepard’s Pie along with a Butterbeer.  
It doesn’t take long until Rosmerta comes back with our drinks and tells us the food should be out in a little while. We thank her a continue on with our date.  
“So, since this is a date, shouldn’t we get to know each other?” I start.  
“Well, yes, but I already know you.” Rose answered back with a hitched eyebrow.  
“So, you say, but I bet I can think of something you don’t know…” I think about it for a minute, “Okay, when’s my birthday?” I ask, since only Albus, Darius, Gerard and Sam know this, as well as my siblings of course I doubt she’ll know it.  
“22nd October 2016… Next?” She answers back quickly.  
“How’d you know that?”  
“I had to go out with Al once and he was looking for your birthday present. It was the year he was split between an Owl or a new Broomstick Servicing Kit. Good thing he didn’t get you an Owl since your parents gave you one for that Birthday.” Rose said laughing, I smiled at her, and so she did know a few things about me.  
“What’s my Owl’s name?”  
“It’s called Midnight, because it’s pure black with white tips on his wings…” Rose said getting bored.  
“Okay, so maybe you do know me. Although they were easy questions…” I huff at her.  
“Okay so give me some harder ones…” She challenges.  
“No, I’m bored of talking about me, let’s talk about you.” I suggest, it was true; I wanted to know more about the fiery red head in front of me.  
“Okay, you want to ask questions or should I ask things you might not know?”  
“Both?” I smile. She sighs in defeat and bites her bottom lip in thought.  
“Okay, an easy one, when is my birthday?” She asks.  
“Erm… 17th November 2006?” I question myself because I’m not 100% sure. But since I’ve been friends with Albus since first year, birthdays of his favourite cousins are bound to rub off. The only one of Albus’ cousins I know for sure though is Victoire’s, the 2nd May is because she was born on the anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts hence her name.  
“Correct… What’s my favourite colour?” She quips as she leans back in her chair taking a sip of her drink.  
I actually have no idea what her favourite colour is… I’m going to have to guess.  
“Yellow?”  
“No, my favourite colour is Lilac.” She emphasizes and sniggers at me.  
“Like I would get that. I’m talking about Green, Blue, and Purple here, not a shade of colour. I would never have gotten that!” I practically shout. Rose just laughs at my outburst and she is still laughing when the food floats over, she leans back to let it settle in front of her and then grabs her knife and fork and starts eating.  
I have to say this girl can eat.  
She is half Weasley though so I have to give her the benefit of the doubt. I leave her to eat in silence for a while before I start the conversation up again.  
“Would you like desert?” I interject.  
“Oh, I don’t know yet, I’ve just finished eating, let’s give it a minute first before I think about consuming even more food. My mum says I take after my dad in that respect, he could just eat and eat too.” She said wistfully.  
“Do you miss him?”  
“Yeah, but I missed him more when mum was sick. Now she’s getting better with the help of your mum I’m growing to accept it now.” She smiles at me sadly.  
“Can you see Thestral’s?” I blurt out all of a sudden. It was something that had been bugging me since the start of the year.  
“Yes, why?” She hesitates.  
“Albus said you could see them too. Sorry if I’ve overstepped a mark” I apologise, I realise that I’m being rude so I go to change the subject before she answers me.  
“You see them too?” Rose inquires at me, obviously intrigued.  
“Yeah, I saw Grandfather Lucius die over the summer, when I came back I saw the Thestral’s pulling the carriages. Hagrid went to take me to see them the other day to…”  
“I’m so sorry about your Grandfather. I like to go visit the Thestral’s to sometimes it’s a lot more peaceful there, has Kali given birth?”  
“You mean Lila? Yes, she has, I haven’t been to see them yet though.”  
“Oh, we should go see them together maybe?” Rose suggests, she still hasn’t told me why she can see them though, I think it’s something to do with her father maybe. I’m not going to push her though; she doesn’t have to tell me anything after all.  
After we finish our dinner and desert we continued to have a laugh and a joke we head out for our walk. We go to Honeydukes so Rose can top up on her sweets, and whatnot. She spends a fair amount of time in there and nearly buys out the shops stock of Chocolate Frogs.  
“Why so many Frogs Weasley?” I ask with a raised eyebrow.  
“I like to collect the cards.” She says as she opens one, when she sees the card she smiles sadly and whispers barely audible “Hiya Daddy…” before slipping the card into her pocket like nothing had happened.  
“You like to collect the cards featuring family member’s right?” I ask nodding towards her pocket so she knows that I saw her dad’s name on there.  
“Yeah, I know it’s sad, but I like collecting them to make them feel closer, after a while you forget what they look like, what their voice sounded like, how annoying they were, how terrible they were at telling jokes. Did you know recently they invented a spell that when the person featured on a Chocolate Frog Card dies, they actually stay in the picture? It’s not the same as having him here but since I can’t carry the portrait we have of him at home around with me it’s the next best thing.” She smiles at me and real heart-warming smile.  
“No, I didn’t know that as it goes, but let’s talk about something happier?”  
“Agreed”  
“Where do you want to go now?”  
“Fancy a trip to the Shrieking Shack?” Rose laughs.  
“I’m not as much as a wimp as my father. I’m guessing somebody told you that story then huh?” I shake my head. Father is never going to live that one down with the amount of Weasley’s around.  
“Mum told me after I overheard her calling your dad a Ferret; she told me all the funny stories about your father. Sorry.” She sniggered. She’s not sorry at all.  
“It’s fine liar.”  
She concedes and we walk to the Shrieking Shack. We spend a while there laughing and joking around throwing snowballs at each other since there is still a littering of snow on the ground around here. We even decided to make Snow Angels.  
What we didn’t notice though as we left to head back was that our Snow Angels were so close to one another they looked like they were holding hands.

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A few hours later I am sitting in the Great Hall after going to the Head’s Common Room with Rose after our ‘date’ and getting dried and cleaned up. I have to say it was one of the better dates I’ve had in my time here at Hogwarts.  
Headmistress Leyson walks in and greets us, “Good evening students, thank you for coming. I would like for you to fill out this piece of parchment before you head off to bed. Thank you for your corporation.”  
Pieces of parchment flew out to everybody and it basically asked who we had our date with and to rate the date out of 10, 1 being the lowest of course. It also asks for added information about how well the two-people got along.  
I filled mine out and gave mine and Rose’s score a 9. It would have been perfect if not for the fact she got a snowball in my face. I handed it over to the Headmistress and went to walk out of the Great Hall.  
“Scorp wait, how was your date with Weasley?” Darius asked  
“It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, I actually really enjoyed it and I think she did to.” I said with a goofy smile on my face, “How was yours?”  
“Yeah it wasn’t too bad, if I get paired with her at least I know what I’m getting, if you know what I mean…” Darius smirked, of course he managed to get her to have sex with him.  
“In Hogsmeade?”  
“Yeah, In the forest, we were quite far in, which is good because she’s a screamer dude.” He said smugly, he was looking all the more impressed with himself.  
“I don’t need to know. Go away and fantasise about it in your own time.”  
“Alright man, I was just kidding jeez, you know where Al is?” He asked looking around, I look around too and spot Xavier Shacklebolt and his date today Odette Swan giving each other a kiss goodnight at the bottom of the marble staircase, so that date obviously went swimmingly.  
“Yeah he’s over there…” I say spotting Al talking to Jasmine and Frankie and Kenny Stewart who looked happy enough, not as happy as Darius but enough to know that their dates weren’t a total disaster area.  
“Thanks dude, see you tomorrow.” Darius says as he claps me on the shoulder and heads over to Al, probably to disgust him with the details of Peters the Screamer.  
I walk up the Marble staircase heading to bed and stop and look at all of the people who are still congregated around the Entrance Hall, and hope that this all ends well.


	9. Christmas At The Weasley's

Chapter 9 – Christmas At The Weasley’s

Rose POV

* * *

 

It’s been just over a month since the compulsory dates started and I have to say, my favourite date so far has to be the one I had with Scorpius a month and half ago, the first one I went on, I’ve now had to go on another five dates since then.

I went on dates with; Darius Zabini, Lorcan Scamander, Jaime Sykes, Lysander Scamander and Xavier Shacklebolt was my date last week, since we’ve already dated, once his name was read out I just went back up to the Head’s Dorm, probably the best idea since I very well could have Avada’d the arsehole. He has for all intents and purposes completely ignored me since we came back to School, so he can go suck Merlin’s left saggy ball sack for all I care about him.

My date with Darius Zabini was funny, telling me hilarious anecdotes about Scorpius and Albus, plenty of blackmail information, so that was great, nothing romantic mind, but I could see us becoming friends which is odd since I’ve never given him the time of day before now. He also told me about how he is expected to join his father in the Family Business ‘Zabini Minerario Inc’ which they own a lot of mining companies in Italy which specifically mine for precious stones, his family currently own 75% of all the mines in Italy making them one of the richest families in Wizarding society which I didn’t know. I gave him a rating of 6/10 because at the very least he was a laugh and we’d probably laugh and joke in our marriage.

Lorcan and Lysander were pretty much the same, I’ve had naked baths with those guys when we were toddlers along with Albus, and quite frankly that is beyond weird so again no romantic feelings. I gave them both a 4/10, nothing personal, which I told them just I can’t see myself seeing them naked or having sex with them, which since we have to provide children I will have to do and the thought just grosses me out too much, they are like cousins to me and it makes me want to puke quite frankly.

Jaime Sykes was just a complete wet blanket; but what can you say about a Hufflepuff? Bless him. He was friendly and sweet but there was no oomph to him, you know what I mean? I’m a Weasley for Merlin’s sake and quite frankly he wouldn’t be able to deal with me. I gave him a 3/10 simply because he didn’t understand the ramifications of possibly being married to a Weasley or Potter after I asked him, since he was Muggleborn he doesn’t quite understand the hype about my family even though he knows my parents and uncle saved the Wizarding world but whatever. He wouldn’t be able to deal with me at all, let alone my family anyway, our tempers are formidable, just ask Malfoy he’s been on the receiving end of mine a few times.

Actually, all the women in my family have very strong personalities and fiery tempers especially my mum, Auntie Ginny and Auntie Fleur, they had or have men in their lives who can ‘tame’ them to an extent. We newer Weasley women are pretty much the same as our predecessors. Mr Sykes would have had too much trouble with me, I have one of the worst of the lot, underneath the Veela’s of course, their ability to produce fire when they’re angry doesn’t help matters.

It was now the day before we left for the Christmas Holidays. I was currently down in the Dungeons working some more on my Wolfsbane 2.0, which I’m still getting nowhere with!

It’s beyond frustrating because all I want to do is help people who are afflicted with the Werewolf curse, yet for some reason the only thing people have managed to come up with is something to just dispel the symptoms but not to cure it. If people cared enough about Werewolves somebody would have tried to find a cure by now right… right? But it’s harder than it looks. You basically have to make a Wolfsbane Potion 50times stronger than the original for all intents and purposes to completely try and get rid of the Symptoms and the cataclysmic Change that comes from a curse like that, or at least I think that’s how it’s going to work... Maybe I’m missing a key ingredient.  

I’ve tried adding nearly half the amount more of all the ingredients, did that work, no. I’ve tried adding extra ingredients to enhance ones that are already in the potion currently, has that worked, no.

I was thinking of completely giving up but Dominique had a bad week last week, she was throwing up and grumpy to everybody. It’s only occasionally that Uncle Bill’s kids get affected by the Full Moon and the Werewolf Curse. For some unknown reason, Teddy doesn’t get affected by it though even though his dad was a full Werewolf. It must have something to do with his Metamorphagus genes. Dominique really suffers the most out of all three of the siblings and when the Full Moon rose, she was throwing up so violently that she nearly had to go St Mungos. Although she is still having after affects from the Potion I sent over I think, still feeling nauseous and weak, she has had to miss two Fashion Shows this week that were showcasing her designs. She wrote to me and told me that Victoire had to cover for her; I hope she is better by Christmas though, it’s no fun when Dominique isn’t there, like last year she was in Italy for Christmas. It was beyond boring, fortunately she’s home this year though.

Nevertheless, this Potion didn’t look like it was going anywhere, so I got rid of it, put all my Potion ingredients and the cauldron and headed up to my common room. Barely anybody was in the corridors because they were probably all still packing their things away. I know for a fact that Hugo, Lily and Belle were still packing since they always leave things until last minute. 

I’ve already packed for Christmas Holidays which we are going to be spending at the Burrow, mum doesn’t like being at home during Christmas because it’s one of the times she misses dad the most. I’ve packed pretty much everything bar School Uniform and books and such the only thing I haven’t packed is Vixen, but that’s mainly because I’ve had trouble finding her. She occasionally sleeps in the Head Common Room, but I’m sure she goes back to Gryffindor Tower each night, although Belle and Frankie haven’t seen her recently either.

I bought all the presents needed over the past couple of Hogsmeade Weekends, after the disastrous dates with various members of my year group. I even brought one for Scorpius; don’t ask me why, I don’t know. I just felt the need to and when I saw it, it screamed ‘Malfoy Heir’ to me, so I had to get it, plus we have been getting closer over the past few weeks, we have been staying up after our dates joking around about how crap they were, never once saying that we preferred the date we had with each other. The other night we stayed up until one in the morning just talking about the dates that we had to suffer. He had to go on dates with a couple of girls he’d already dated too, so that was beyond awkward, he didn’t chicken out like me though, so much for Gryffindor Bravery huh?

The train was due to pick us up in an hour so we had to get our trunks down into the entrance hall and be in the Great Hall to be taken to Hogsmeade Station by the coaches. My trunk was still in my room and Vixen was still nowhere to be found.

* * *

 

“Vixen where are you!?” I say to myself. I’ve been looking for my blasted cat for at least half hour yet still no sign of her.

I was looking underneath my bed, in my wardrobe, even in the bathroom cupboards. Nothing.

I went to Scorpius’ room and knocked on the door, two heads are better than one right?

“Come in.” He shouted.

I walked into his room and right there on the bed was my missing ginger cat, Vixen cuddled up to another cat, this one was white with Grey ears and face with Rosette markings down the side of its body. The cat was very big and I’d weirdly never seen it before.

“Are you serious right now? I’ve been looking everywhere for you!” I say scooping up the ginger cat. She eyes me with pure distain because I’ve just moved her from the middle of the bed where she was happily snuggled up to the other cat.

“Oh, is she yours? She’s been chilling out in here for a month or so now, just thought she’d seen me around and adopted me she’s taken to Hunter awfully well. You know how cats are.” Scorpius says looking over at me and Vixen from over the other side of the room sorting out his bookcase.

“So that’s where you’ve been hiding you cheeky cat! Hunter? Is that your cat? I’ve never seen him before…” I say snuggling my face into her fur, she was so soft and had beautifully smooth ginger fur and piercing Amber eyes. She was not very happy with me though as she was growling slightly. I place her on the floor and she saunters over to Malfoy and weaves in and out of his legs, then proceeds to jump back onto his bed and snuggle back up to hunter who purred in response.

“I think she likes me… and Hunter…” Scorpius says laughing slightly leaning down to pick up my traitorous cat.

“No, I think she likes Hunter. What breed is he?” I asked noticing his markings look awfully like a wild cat.

“He’s a Rosette Seal Lynx Bengal, I’m surprised you haven’t seen or heard him, they’re very loud and like to climb on things, a few times he’s been in the common room and knocked things off the side.” Scorpius answers me with a smirk.

“Oh so that’s how my ink pot wound up on the floor.” I say walking over to Hunter and stroking his belly. He rolled over and allowed me purring obnoxiously loud.

“He’s so soft.” I murmur, watching Hunter get up at go and groom Vixen, licking her face and snuggling up to her.

“Hmm… not sure you’re going to be able to take them two away from each other, she’s been coming in here for about a month or so and they’re always together.”

“I’m going to have to try though; they can’t stay here alone over the holidays.” I say whilst pulling my wand out my pocket, “Accio, Cat Carrier.” I summon. The Cat Carrier came into Malfoy’s room no problem through the bathroom and landed on the floor by my feet. Opening it and placing Vixen in it got me a few scratches and a hiss or two, she was not happy to be taken away from her cat friend.

“Have a nice Christmas Scorpius. I’ll see you at Uncle Harry’s New Year’s Ball?” I query, since I’m not entirely sure if he was coming or not, he was invited of course since he is friends with Albus and has been invited since first year, after third year his whole family were invited.

Uncle Harry tended to host a Ball of sorts at his Manor just outside of London every year, he switches each year between Christmas and a New Year’s Ball, and this year is the New Year’s Ball. It was always a formal affair whether it be Christmas or New Year, so Dress Robes are a must, it’s a good time for Ministry Personnel to schmooze and get to know other people and other families also for those who are close to Graduating talking to Head of Departments in various sectors of the Ministry, St. Mungo’s or other areas of work in the Magical Community.

“We are spending Christmas in America with Carina’s husband Christopher’s family. We should be back in time for the New Year’s Ball though, I haven’t missed one in seven years, and I doubt we will miss this one. I think Carina might be coming too.” Scorpius tells me.

“Have a nice holiday then and I’ll see you then.” I nod to him and send my trunk and Vixen down to the Entrance Hall.

“Don’t be getting anymore secret piercings over the New Year Weasley; we know what happens when you drink Alcohol!” Scorpius reminds me flirtatiously; I flip him off and head out of the room smiling all the while.

* * *

 

The train journey home was pretty boring, after the Prefect meeting which was telling them about how things would work after Christmas I just stayed in the Heads compartment because I was sick and tired with all the talk of the impending marriage ceremony in just under five months. The closer this seems to get people seem to be getting more and more anxious, me on the other hand just want to pass my exams so I can go into Potion making full time or maybe become a Healer.

After pulling into Kings Cross station I found my mum who was smiling sadly at us, Christmas was always one of the worst holidays for us to be without dad.

“Hey mum, we missed you.” I said giving mum a hug which made her smile larger, Hugo came over to join in too.

“Come on kids, we are staying with Uncle Harry until we go to the Burrow in a few days then we will go back home for the remainder of the holidays, but we’re going to drop off some things before we head there. You don’t need the entire contents of your school trunks after all!” Mum laughed and grabbed our hands, we said goodbye for now to the rest of the family and I felt a sharp pull in my navel and we appeared outside of our house.

We went inside and the smell of fresh bread and cookies filled the air, mum had become slightly better at the whole cooking thing, although not great, but she definitely excelled in baking bread and sweets. I let Vixen out of her cage which she was pretty happy about and headed to the kitchen following my nose, I am a Weasley after all.

I walked into the kitchen and grabbed a couple of cookies and went to sit in the sitting room. We had a portrait of dad over the fire place and as soon as he saw me he smiled.

“Hi Rosie Posie, How was school! I’m so proud of you becoming Head Girl! Who was Head Boy?”

“School is great daddy, everybody’s going nuts over this Marriage Law thing now though, they’re more worried over that than N.E.W.Ts, and Scorpius Malfoy is Head Boy but he’s actually been okay recently. We’ve been so busy doing our own things we actually barely see each other except for in classes and Head Meetings, even the Head Dorms we barely see each other.” I inform him with a smile. I know the portraits aren’t actually the person but at least we still get to talk to him, or at least an impression of him.

“Dad, guess what!” Hugo then suddenly shouts.

“Hugo, be quiet please, indoor voice, you aren’t at Hogwarts now dear.” Mum chastens him from within the kitchen.

“What Hugo?” Dad says knowing where this is going.

“We pulled the most amazing prank a few weeks ago; we turned the whole of Slytherin into Flamingos with some of Uncle Georges Flamingo Fancies! It was hilarious. Although Leyson didn’t find it funny so gave me and Lily detention even though it was Phoenix’s idea since Scorpius had annoyed her by saying she couldn’t date somebody the week before.” He mumbled towards the end. Dad just laughed.

“Of course George would supply you guys with merchandise if you’re pranking the Slytherin’s never got over the hate for them did he…” Dad smiled.

“Neither did you Ronald, so don’t start reprimanding your brother for something you would have done also.” Mum said scathingly towards dad after she levitated mine and Hugo’s trunks into our rooms.

“Hermione, I would never…” Dad said with a smirk then burst out laughing causing the rest of us to laugh too.

“Right kids, go pack your things for staying at Uncle Harry’s for a few days, we will come back before the burrow to wash the clothes we take with us and grab the gifts for everybody so just enough for three days okay! Oh and Hugo, don’t forget to feed your Owl, there was no food in his cage when I took him upstairs, he enjoyed his mouse I just have him though.”

I go upstairs to my room and start packing for our stay over at Potter Manor. They did live in Grimmauld Place for a while, But Ginny couldn’t stand the Portrait of Mrs Black screaming at all hours of the day and night when she was pregnant with Albus, so they decided to move to somewhere they’d have more space after all, they needed somewhere other than a kitchen cupboard for Kreacher to live and somewhere for Buckbeak to live as well as of course Dumbledore’s Phoenix, Fawkes who decided to adopt Uncle Harry after the war ended since Harry earned the right of Fawkes trusting him.

After that they moved to a village on the outskirts of London, where Uncle Harry bought a Manor. It had servant’s quarters for Kreacher and their newly acquired House Elves, from the Ministry for Services to The Wizarding World; Posey, Breeze, Loopy and Reef who is Andromeda Tonks’ House Elf, but since she lives with them now since Teddy moved out in the ‘Granny Flat’ the Manor provided, her House Elf now lives in the servants quarters with the others until needed.

Mum doesn’t like it too much and refused our own House Elf, much to the Ministry’s dismay, but she cannot complain anymore since they have clothes, holidays, sick days and maternity/paternity and that they get paid, she can’t really complain. Loopy and Breeze are James, Albus and Lily’s House Elves, they focuses on the Children when Harry and Ginny aren’t home and Kreacher is Uncle Harry’s and Aunt Ginny’s, he doesn’t even call them nasty names anymore since Uncle Harry got Kreacher, his old Master Regulus’ necklace back which he still wears with pride. As mentioned before Reef is Andromeda’s and Posey well, she looks after the House, Animals and the Grounds, she was originally on child duty (one for each child) but she was a tad to clumsy, so instead of firing her which my mum flat out told them not to because after all mum did found S.P.E.W, they decided to allow her to have her own set of jobs, which she was very excited about. She had many animals to watch after including Fawkes when he was having an ‘off’ day, Artemis Lily’s Kneazle kitten, Gynx Albus’ Owl, and James’ Owl Hedwig II.  

I unpacked all of my belongs very quickly after levitating them into their correct places, my books over to my reading nook around my window that looks out onto the grounds outside of our house. You can sometimes see Deer running around which is nice. The wildlife around where we live is pretty nice to watch, Birds of Prey like Hawks, Buzzards and Kites and of course the occasional wild Barn Owl, not just Postal Owls.

I packed pyjamas and enough clothes for a few days as well as a few spares and my Quidditch things which I shrunk down do it would fit in my bag. Guaranteed James will force us all for a Quidditch game before going to the Burrow.

We stayed an had dinner at our own house first since mum had already cooked it, apparently Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny invited us round to stay whilst waiting for the Hogwarts Express to turn up to which mum accepted. We had a lovely Chilli Con Carne with a Chocolate Lava Cake with Custard for desert, and after that we headed over to Uncle Harry’s, it was about 9.30pm by now, but that was plan to go there and then go straight to bed. It has been a long day after all.

I went over to the fireplace a threw some Floo Powder into the fire place waiting to the flames to turn green and stepped in, I shouted “Potter Manor” very clearly and off I wizzed.

I tumbled out of the fire place coughing and spluttering dusting off the inevitable soot that you get on yourself whilst Floo traveling.

“Hello there Rosie, Nice to see you, Everybody else has gone to bed after such a long day so they’ll see you in the morning, your usual room is set up for you darling and we will see you in the morning.” Aunt Ginny greeted and sent me off up two floors to the room I always used from when I was old enough to have my own room.

I walked up the two flights of stairs with my backpack over my shoulder and headed up to bed. I literally got changed and jumped into bed within the first five minutes of being in the room and fell straight into a deep sleep.

* * *

 

Rolling over in bed I wake up to notice somebody is sitting on the end, I go to kick them off to which they start sniggering.

“Really Rosie, is that the way to treat your favourite cousin?” The voice at the end of the bed says. I roll over and open one eye, glancing at the clock on the bedside I see that it’s 8am, about time I should wake up really. I then look to the end of the bed and see a black messy haired man child sitting there with a mischievous smirk on his face.

“Really James…? Couldn’t have waited until I woke up to the smell of Aunt Ginny cooking Bacon this morning?” I mumbled my voice still croaky from sleep.

“No little Red, we have some planning to do.” He said grabbing my covers and yanking them off, this is one of the reasons coming to stay at Uncle Harry’s probably isn’t the best of ideas.

“Don’t you have to go to work?” I asked hoping this would send him off on his way, the face he has on normally means he wants my help and brains to pull a prank which being this early would not equate into anything fabulous.

“Oh shit, you’re right, last day of training before we stop for Christmas! See you later Posie, we will finish this later!” He said shooting out the room. I huff and roll over again, I was just drifting back off when there was a knock at the door.

“Come in!” I shouted. The door opened a shut without any one speaking, until I heard a little throat clear.

“Mistress Weasley, breakfast is served downstairs if Mistress is hungry this morning.” The cute female House Elf called Loopy informed me.

“Thank you Loopy I’ll be down in a minute.” I said stretching and getting out of bed and heading to my bathroom. After doing my business and brushing my hair and teeth I headed downstairs to breakfast, still in my pyjamas. We can eat breakfast in our pyjamas but for dinner at Uncle Harry’s we always dress up nicely.

Walking into the kitchen people were situated around the large dining table the only one missing being Hugo who could sleep like the dead so even Loopy wouldn’t be able to wake him they gave up a couple of years back.

Sitting myself down and helping myself to some Eggs, toast, Bacon, sausages and beans I started eating. Everybody was doing their own thing. Albus was eating breakfast to absorbed into his boiled egg and soldiers that he didn’t even notice, Lily was slyly feeding Artemis some of her sausage under the table, no wonder her cat is fat, Mum was reading the Daily Prophet, Uncle Harry was reading the paper also, but this one seemed Muggle, since he is the head of the Auror department he keeps tabs on the crime in the Muggle world in case anything can be accountable to Magic. Aunt Ginny was currently reading the new issue of Quidditch Quarterly which she writes for on occasion, and Andromeda was writing a letter at the table probably to her Sister whom now she is back in contact with now that they both have lost their husbands.

Uncle Harry then places his paper down and looks towards my mother, “’Mione, do you mind coming to read this?” He says gesturing to his paper; mum puts her paper down and heads over, reading it fairly quickly.

“Hmm, could be something but I would get Kingsley to double check with the Muggle Prime Minister before starting an unwanted investigation.” Mum suggested to which Uncle Harry nodded and placed his paper down.

“Oh good morning Rosie, didn’t see you come down, how’s school been?” He asks kindly.

“Oh it’s been okay, people worrying to much about the impending weddings we all have to suffer rather than focusing on their futures and N.E.W.T exams.” I huffed.

“Just like your mother you are Rosie.” Uncle Harry says adoringly, “Anyway, so how are the dates going that you guys set up at school?” Harry asked me and Albus.

“Yeah they’re alright, I have a couple with some girls who I wouldn’t mind being with but honestly if I get put with a Carrow or a Flint-Carrow I’m going to kill myself so expect me to ‘avada’ myself if I’m paired with one of those idiots.” Albus said shivering at the possible thought after looking up from his all-consuming breakfast.

“What about you Rose?” He asked shaking his head with a smile at his over exaggerative son.

“Well I went on dates with both the Scamander’s which was beyond strange since we used to bath together when we were babies. Xavier and I were paired up to but I avoided him like the plague because he has ignored me since we returned from summer break. Jaime Sykes is a sweet Hufflepuff, but again, he wouldn’t be able to deal with me he’s too much of a pushover. I went on a date with Malfoy too which wasn’t too bad either, I can see why you guys like him…” I smiled with a blush, I hope nobody realises how much I did enjoy that date.

“Yes Scorpius is a good boy, much like Narcissa, he is very well mannered and a gentleman. Whoever gets married to him is going to be a very lucky lady.” Andromeda added since she is his Great Aunt.

“Yes very lucky.” I mumbled under my breath barely audible. Dinner continued on without much more conversation and after we all went to our respective rooms. I fell asleep pretty quickly since the journey was long today.

* * *

 

It was now the 24th December meaning it was Christmas Eve and we were to head over to The Burrow. We had already gone home and done the washing fed all the animals and repacked our bags for staying over Grandma’s not forgetting the gifts for everybody else of course. We arrived to the Burrow by apparition since Grandma didn’t like people Flooing for some reason after the war.

We arrived just outside of the boundaries of the mismatched house in Ottery St Catchpole and walked over to where the house is. It didn’t take us to long, or at least it shouldn’t have done but apparently it had been snowing in Devon – just slightly, but even the little amount of snow was making it difficult to walk to The Burrow.

We made it eventually though and walked through the back door which led straight into the houses kitchen and was immediately greeted by an overjoyed Molly Weasley, she was now much older and had more grey hairs and more wrinkles around her face, but she was still as spritely as ever in the kitchen and gave you a fierce hug when she greeted you.

“Oh Rosie, Hermione and Hugo, glad you’re here! Rosie, you’ll be sharing the room with Lily, Roxanne, Dominique, Addie and Lucy, first floor, Ginny’s old room. They should be up there getting situated, and Hugo you’ll be in Ron’s old room with the rest of the boys.” Grandma said whilst shuffling us out of her kitchen. Hugo and I headed up to our respective bedrooms for the duration of our stay which should only be until Boxing Day when we get a Portkey to Australia to visit Grandma Granger and Grandpa Granger, who went there during the war when mum erased their memories once she returned it, they decided to stay since they were doing extremely well over there, plus it was better for their health with Grandpa’s arthritis the weather over there kept his bones pain free. We will be there over the rest of the holidays until December 30th, to come home in time for Uncle Harry’s New Year’s Eve Ball.

I walked up the stairs to the first floor landing which held Aunty Ginny’s old room and went in. There was Lucy laying on their put me up bed reading a book, Dominique was sleeping on the bed, Addie was lying down on the bed with a copy of Witch Weekly with Lily next to her gossiping about some column on it, and Roxanne was elsewhere. There were four put me up beds and Ginny’s old bed. The oldest always got the bed which meant Nicki got it this year. The others had to suffer the put me ups.

Bill and Fleur along with Charlie and Corina were sharing their old room again with a privacy wall added of course. Grandma and Grandpa obviously had their own room, and the boys were in Fred and Georges old room which consisted of James and Fred bunking in one bed and Al and Hugo bunking in another with two put me ups placed in there. Uncle Percy and Aunt Audrey were in Uncle Percy’s old room.

Grandma and Grandpa were quite obviously in their own room. Uncle Harry and Aunty Ginny were in Uncle Ron’s old room with Uncle George and Aunt Angelina again with a partition wall placed in there for privacy.

Grandma and Grandpa had managed to evict the Ghoul in the attic eventually so now that is made to be Victoire, Teddy and the girls room with a partition wall put up so that they have some privacy. Molly was in the other room with her partner Wyatt and her baby bump which was huge because she was carrying twins, two girls to be exact; she is due in the New Year around March time.

I set my stuff down and went over to Nicki and sat down next to her sleeping form and shook her slightly she opened an eye and smiled.

“Hey Posie, How’re you gorge?” Nicki says sitting herself up. She look white as a sheet and looked really lethargic.

“I’m fine, it’s you I’m worried about Nicki.” I say checking her over, “Is it because of the Full Moon?” I asked the obvious question.

“Well, I felt crabby before, but I’ve felt worse over the course of it, but Ro, the Full Moon was six days ago, I shouldn’t still be feeling this way.” Nicki huffed out bleakly.

“Come on let’s take you downstairs, maybe Grandma has something downstairs that’ll help you.” I suggest and she nods, she gets up slowly and we head downstairs together. We pass the adults who were talking in the living room, and head straight to the Kitchen where’d we knew we’d find Grandma cooking dinner for a small army.

“Grandma do you have anything for Nicki, she’s still not recovered from the Full Moon this month.” We asked as soon as we got in there.

“Let me see you Nicki love.” Grandma says running her hands over her, she feels her head which she frowns at, then moves down to her neck checking her lymph nodes nothing swollen, she moves down to under her arms where more lymph nodes are and Nicki winces, “Something tender here dear?” Grandma questions

“Yeah, my boobs are a bit sore when I raise my arms.” Nicki says and looks sad.

“Hmm… Are you sexually active at the moment Nicki, are you seeing somebody currently?” Grandma asks to which Nicki goes bright red and inclines her head slightly in affirmation.

“Have you taken a pregnancy test?” She suggests with a raised eyebrow, Nicki looks stunned and goes into shock, I’m not much better since I have no idea who she’s seeing, nobody does actually. She’s been seeing this guy on and off for a while but won’t tell anybody who he is.

Guess now we will find out.

Dinner goes off without a hitch and afterwards Nicki and I head upstairs to the bathroom where she takes the pregnancy test which consists of two potions one to determine whether you are pregnant or not which will make your stomach glow gold and another which makes your stomach glow with either a pink or blue colour to determine the sex of the baby, if there is more than one it’ll glow in different places wherever the babies were which is not compulsory to take if you wanted a surprise.

Dom took the first potion which caused her stomach to glow gold confirming her pregnancy, “Oh shit.” Nicki whispers.

“Oh Nicki, congratulations!” I whisper shout at her and hug her, “Don’t worry I won’t tell anyone if you don’t want me to.” I say to her in her ear.

“Oh Rosie, I don’t know what to do!” She sniffles, I realise she is crying, I step back and take her face in my hands.

“Nicki, you’re going to be a great mum. Think of how great you were when Ophelia and Will were babies, and how you’re with them now. You’ll be great, I promise.” I say to her with determination in my voice because if anybody will be a great mum it’ll be Nicki.

* * *

 

“Rosie wake up!” I hear outside the bedroom door banging, “It’s Christmas!” Hugo shouts at me, this stirs me and I stretch and get out of bed, along with the rest of the rooms occupants. I headed downstairs to the living room where mum and Hugo were sitting on the couch mum used as her bed last night with the rest of the family gathered around.

“Merry Christmas mum, Hugo.” I said hugging each of them in turn and sat down next to mum, “Merry Christmas, Everybody.”

“Merry Christmas Rosie,” was said by many a person to which then start the chorus of Merry Christmas to everybody.

“Now, get on with opening the presents you sad sacks!” James demanded, never failing to make us laugh.

I moved over on the small couch and summoned my gifts over.

“Rosie, that’s cheating!” Shouted Hugo and Lily simultaneously, scaring each other with how alike they are.

“Accio, Hugo’s Gifts…” I said sending them over to the irate boy, he smiled in thanks and began delving into his own gifts and I did the same with Lily’s gifts also before Grandma started sending everybody’s gifts to the correct recipient.

I opened the one from mum first and saw it was the new series of books I was wanting from a Muggle Author called Tabitha Trevallion who wrote all sorts of fantasy books. I prefer sometimes to read from a Muggle’s point of view simply because the restrictions on magic to them don’t apply.

After unwrapping the rest of my presents which consisted of specially designed clothes and accessories from Victoire and Dominique, a new Chess set from Louis, Hugo got me a new pair of Dragon Hide Chaser gloves for Quidditch since I kept dropping the Quaffle during the last practice – which obviously meant this was a late gift since the last practice we had was a week ago, nevertheless I thanked him and moved on, Fred got me a new leather jacket which he gets from a tailor who specialises in dragon hide leather and Roxy got me Season tickets to the Harpies which are my favourite team, Albus got me a new set of calligraphy Quills which must have cost him a lot of money, James got me a voucher for Tomes and Scrolls and Lily got me a necklace and earrings set. The rest of the settled on generic things like socks which Uncle Percy and Aunt Audrey got me, Uncle George and Aunt Angelina gave me some products from WWW and Grandma and Grandpa gave me my traditional Weasley jumper, which is purple with a white ‘R’ on the front. Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny got me a voucher for Madam Malkin’s I’m guessing for my wedding dress… and everybody else got me books of some kind.

We then went into the extended kitchen and ate breakfast which consisted of bacon, sausages, eggs, beans, and hash browns for me and whatever everybody else liked for themselves. I dipped some of my toast into my egg coating it in delicious yolk and munched on that like it was a lifeline.

After that we were all chucked out of the Burrow so Grandma could get started on cooking Christmas Dinner which she does require help with since more people come to eat with us over the Holidays. Aunt Fleur and Aunt Angelina are the best at Household spells so they help Grandma with the cooking of dinner whilst Mum and Aunt Audrey are on dessert duty.

The families that tend to be invited to Christmas are of course, the Longbottom’s; Neville, Hannah, Frankie and Gus, come along sometimes now that neither Neville or Hannah have any immediate family left; and The Scamander’s, Luna, Rolf, Lucia, Lorcan and Lysander also come along and some years so do, The Delacour-Roux’s Fleur’s sister Gabrielle’s family, her husband Léon Henri Roux, André Léon, Théodore Henri, Noëlle Èva, occasionally come over and visit, but this year they are staying in France and spending time with Léon’s family in Cannes. I do wonder sometimes how Grandma Weasley manages to fit so many people in one rickety old house.

Undetectable extension charms are behind it I think. 

How Grandma even manages to cook enough food for everybody is beyond me and I haven’t a clue how she manages it. It’s actually pretty amazing to watch, its magical, the synchronicity to be able to get all of the implements working together is amazing, and she does it all by herself normally except of course for Christmas when she does require help.

* * *

 

The family Quidditch match finishes pretty quickly with Uncle Harry’s team winning after he caught the snitch right under Albus’ nose, which he was not impressed about, but he doesn’t normally play the Seeker position anyway, so his dad did let him off for that.

We played another game before Grandma called us in for dinner, the Longbottom’s and the Scamander’s have turned up by now, Luna and Neville were talking to each other in the living room Rolf was talking to his daughter Lucia who they barely see anymore because she is so busy at work, she is a broom maker. She decided to take up the profession after finding out most brooms are made by the thousands and are all the same. So Lucia decided to start making custom Brooms for people, yet she only makes up to 700 of each Broom, including children’s versions. She is very sought after and the England Quidditch Team have her make of Brooms which is called Venus Brooms. They are some of the fastest in the world, James has one along with Fred and Roxanne some of the only ones in the league because they play for England when the World Cup is on.

The twins were probably causing mischief somewhere as per usual. We all sat down at the table when called and waited for Grandma and Grandpa to sit down, they sat down when everybody was seated. We have this tradition where we go around the table and say a name of somebody who died in the Wars to remember them.

“We will now go round the table and remember the members of our families and friends who are no longer with us, I will begin with Fabien and Gideon Prewett my brothers, may they rest in peace.” Grandma Weasley said with a tear in her eye, it then went clockwise around the table.

“Albus Dumbledore and Alastor Moody, may they rest in peace.” Grandpa Weasley said.

“James and Lily Potter, Sirius Black and Cedric Diggory, may they rest in peace.” Uncle Harry spoke softly.

“Ronald Weasley, Colin Creevy and Dobby, may they rest in peace” Mum said softly lifting her glass.

“Remus Lupin and Nymphadora Tonks, may they rest in peace.” Teddy lifted his glass high and drank.

“Ted Tonks and Bellatrix Lestrange, may they rest in peace.” Andromeda said quietly, she always represented her sister, because as she said, she wasn’t always bad, she just fell in love with the wrong person, somebody who saw the world a different way and corrupted her.

“Fred Weasley, may he rest in peace.” Uncle George said sadly a tear running down his eye. Uncle George always just said his twins name because I guess half of himself died that day too.

“Frank and Alice Longbottom, may they rest.” Neville said raising a glass, others raised their glasses

“And to the rest of the fallen, may they rest in peace!” Grandpa Weasley said loudly, we all cheered solemnly and drank to the speech, then dinner was served, we then all started eating and the atmosphere changed from sad to happy. We liked to as a family represent all of those lost during the War, especially Uncle Harry. He commemorates them during the New Year’s Ball too, since it has many of the Wizarding Families that were affected.

Dominique who was sitting next to me looked a bit peaky after seeing the Brussels sprouts put in front of her and done a runner to the bathroom to throw up probably. Fleur and Bill turned round at the sound of Nicki running out of the room and when Grandma noticed what happened she moved the Sprouts away from Nicki’s seat. When she came back she was a lot happier, but she stayed standing none the less and grabbed my hand for comfort.

People were rounding up eating their dinners some going back for seconds or thirds if you’re James, Fred and Hugo. The rest stopped at either one helping or at the very least two. Beside me Nicki started getting figgity whilst she looked at the clock in the kitchen. Considering she was writing a letter earlier which she sent off pretty sharpish must mean she’s waiting for somebody to turn up at some point.

“Erm, guys, I’d like to make a quick announcement… As some of you know I’ve been feeling especially rough during this Full Moon and went to Grandma earlier for some medicine… Gran asked me to take a pregnancy potion which came out positive, so I’m going to have a baby and it’s a girl…” Dominique shared with us still slightly in shock.

Everybody else was overjoyed at the prospect of a new family member. All except one.

“Have you told the father Dominique?” Uncle Bill asked her sternly.

“Yes, he is happy and on his way over now to meet the family, I know it’s been a long time coming but guys I really do love him so please be nice and no judgements.” She pleaded, as if her timing was perfect there was a knock at the back door. She ran over to answer it and in came a tall around 6’4, coffee colour skin, dark eyes and short hair. He looked very well put together in a smart suit with a button up shirt obviously just come from dinner with his family for Christmas.

“So everybody this is my boyfriend, Elexus Zabini, and Lex, this is everyone…” Dominique introduced, looking now at Elexus you can see the family resemblance between him and Darius. Albus stood up and greeted Elexus first since he already knew him from being friends with Darius since first year and the rest followed, after a while it was noted that neither Bill nor Fleur had gone to greet him rather waiting towards the back.

“I think we should give the family a little peace.” I suggest, James and Fred complain about wanting to watch the fall out but then remember they have a stash of extendable ears so they can listen instead so they run off upstairs to get them whilst everybody else evacuates the kitchen into the living room which is now bursting.

* * *

 

The meeting between the families went pretty well and Elexus stayed for dessert having sent a letter back home to say he was staying. Apparently Nicki had met Elexus’ parents and family, since it’s a pretty small family but Nicki was huge so she didn’t want to introduce them to each other in case things didn’t work out. Now she had no choice.

Uncle Bill asked whether they were going to get married before the baby was born to which Dominique hastily cast _silencio_ to stop him from talking then informed him that’ll they talk it over themselves and to stop pushing.

After that everything was pretty boring except for the prank James and Fred pulled on the girls excluding Nicki, Vicki and Molly, mainly because fire balls are hard to dodge from a pregnant Veela and just pregnant Weasley women aren’t much better either. They decided to put something in the girls shower water that made all of our hair change colour depending on our mood. They obviously got the idea from Teddy and Ophelia. Since after we realised what had happened and most of our hair turned back to red it was deemed pointless so they reversed it.

We were now leaving the Burrow and heading home then off to Grandma and Granddad Grangers house in Australia. They live near Sydney and Bondi Beach so going there during the winter and it being summer really throws everything off balance but it’s lovely to be able to sunbathe in December.

We went home for a day and put all of our new gifts away. Vixen was quite happy with the charm mum placed on her food bowl so it kept refilling from the stock in the kitchen so she was always fed and watered. The same with Hugo’s Owl and the Family Owl. As long as there’s stock in the house they will get fed. Mum takes the spell off when we go to school though because it’s meant to ‘teach us responsibility’, but since I’m Head Girl and actually remember to feed my Cat I’m guessing it’s mainly for teaching Hugo.

Once we are ready to go, we Apparate to the Ministry and go to their Portkey International Travel Office to get our pre-ordered Portkey to take us to Australia. We get there and are given a box with a Portkey in and shown into a room, mum opens the box and we each put a hand or finger onto the old cassette tape which mum said she hasn’t seen in nearly thirty odd years and that it’s a Muggle contraption to play music.

I feel a pull in my navel and then all of a sudden we are in the open air in a field. It’s boiling outside so we instantly grab onto mum and she apparates us to Grandma and Granddad Granger’s house.

Once there we are given a boat load of sweets to keep us going and they stick the barbeque on since its Boxing Day. So cold cuts and some fresh bits but not a feast full like Grandma Weasley does.

We talk about their retirement and how that’s going, they ask me and Hugo about School so we tell them, never being surprised about what Hugo tells them knowing he’s mischievous. They give us our gifts; I got a iPod, and Hugo got a Gaming System which he can’t take to school, but I can take mine to school. Mum got new editions of some Muggle books she likes.

All in all, Christmas was an eventful time, but I can’t wait for the New Year and for what lies ahead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please make sure to leave Kudos or comments just so I know people are liking this story. Also, I have a Tumblr page where I upload things to do with this story on occasion underneath the name lovealwayswinsintheend


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